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In one particular enclosure, surrounded by a fence of papyrus, thirty of these huts served us dwellings for the chief's slaves, in another group lived his wives, and a "tembe," still larger and higher, was half hidden in a plantation of cassada. Such was the residence of the King of Kazounde, a man of fifty named Moini Loungga; and already almost deprived of the power of his predecessors.
When we went to visit Mussoud bin Abdullah, he showed me the very ground where Burton and Speke's house stood now pulled down and replaced by his office Sny bin Amer's house was also torn down, and the fashionable tembe of Unyanyembe, now in vogue, built over it, finely-carved rafters huge carved doors, brass knockers, and lofty airy rooms a house built for defence and comfort.
Proceeding through the semi-desert rolling table-land in one place occupied by men who build their villages in large open squares of flat-topped mud huts, which, when I have occasion to refer to them in future, I shall call by their native name tembe we could see on the right hand the massive mountains overhanging the Mukondokua river, to the front the western chain of these hills, and to the left the high crab-claw shaped ridge, which, extending from the western chain, circles round conspicuously above the swelling knolls which lie between the two main rocky ridges.
On the 24th they reached Caze, where Speke had remained so long on his former visit. His old friend, Musa, came out to meet them, and escorted them to his tembe, or house, where he invited them to reside till he could find porters to carry their property to Karague, promising to go there with them himself.
As I saw he was in a humour to pick a quarrel with me before those Arabs who had congregated outside of my tembe to witness my departure; and as I was not in a humour to be balked by anything that might turn up, the consequence was, that I was obliged to thrash Bombay, an operation which soon cooled his hot choler, but brought down on my head a loud chorus of remonstrances from my pretended Arab friends "Now, master, don't, don't stop it, master: the poor man knows better than you what he and you may expect on the road you are now taking."
I also got him to have all my coils of brass and copper wire made into bracelet, as is customary, to please the northern people. 7th. To-day information was brought here that whilst Manua Sera was on his way from Ugogo to keep his appointment with me, Sheikh Snay's army came on him at Tura, where he was ensconced in a tembe.
Within three-quarters of an hour we were seated on the mud veranda of the tembe of Sultan bin Ali, who, because of his age, his wealth, and position being a colonel in Seyd Burghash's unlovely army is looked upon by his countrymen, high and low, as referee and counsellor. His boma or enclosure contains quite a village of hive-shaped huts and square tembes.
The Sultan thought that if all caravans were as well guarded as mine were, there would be less depredations committed on them while on the road; with which I heartily agreed. The next sultan's tembe through whose territory we marched, this being on the 30th May, was at Kididimo, but four miles from Bihawna.
The road from the latter place ran along the skirts of the Mpwapwa range; at three or four places it crossed outlying spurs that stood isolated from the main body of the range. The last of these hill spurs, joined by an elevated cross ridge to the Mpwapwa, shelters the tembe of Chunyo, situated on the western face, from the stormy gusts that come roaring down the steep slopes.
I halted a day at Kusuri to give my caravan a rest, after its long series of marches, before venturing on the two days' march through the uninhabited wilderness that separates the district of Jiweh la Singa Uyanzi from the district of Tura in Unyanyembe. Hamed preceded, promising to give Sayd bin Salim notice of my coming, and to request him to provide a tembe for me.
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