me for guidance. Accordingly I professed to believe in their promises to
accompany me to the east, although I knew of their conspiracy; and I
trusted that by tact and good management I should eventually thwart all
their plans, and, although forced out of my intended course, I should be
able to alter my route, and to work round from the east to my original
plan of operations south. The interpreter given by Koorshid Aga had
absconded: this was a great loss, as I had no means of communication
with the natives except by casually engaging a Bari in the employment of
the traders, to whom I was obliged to pay exorbitantly in copper
bracelets for a few minutes' conversation.

A party of Koorshid's people had just arrived with ivory from the
Latooka country, bringing with them a number of that tribe as porters.
These people were the most extraordinary that I had seen--wearing
beautiful helmets of glass beads, and being remarkably handsome. The
chief of the party, "Adda," came to my tent, accompanied by a few of his
men. He was one of the finest men I ever saw, and he gave me much
information concerning his country, and begged me to pay him a visit. He
detested the Turks, but he was obliged to serve them, as he had received
orders from the great chief "Commoro" to collect porters, and to
transport their ivory from Latooka to Gondokoro. I took his portrait, to
his great delight, and made him a variety of presents of copper
bracelets, beads, and a red cotton handkerchief; the latter was most
prized, and he insisted upon wearing it upon his person. He had no
intention of wearing his new acquisition for the purpose of decency, but
he carefully folded it so as to form a triangle, and then tied it round
his waist, so that the pointed end should hang exactly straight BEHIND
him. So particular was he, that he was quite half an hour in arranging
this simple appendage; and at length he departed with his people, always
endeavouring to admire his new finery, by straining his neck in his