his energies to the new work before him, and to leave
to other hands the task of completing the development
of the new European administration — a task which has
since been considerably facilitated by the death of the
late Sultan Seyyid Ali, whose views grew more and more
obstructionist as time proceeded, and by the establish-
ment on the throne of the present enlightened ruler
Seyyid Hamed bin Thwain, who has most loyally
co-operated in every scheme for the improvement of
the island and the condition of all classes of its
inhabitants. For his services in Zanzibar and on the
coast Gerald Portal was rewarded with the K.C.M.G.
How the Uganda Mission was organised and carried
out he has told himself in the following pages, and no
more need be said about it here ; but, in conclusion,
his services to his country in a career in which the
younger members seldom are able to emerge from
the body of their contemporaries, and find but rare
opportunities of distinguishing themselves, may be
summed up as having consisted in the work which he
xliv THE MISSION TO UGANDA
performed while only a subordinate in Cairo, in the
adventurous expedition to Abyssinia, in his initial
organisation of the Zanzibar Protectorate with which
his name will always be associated, and, lastly, in
the Mission to Uganda, — a considerable record for so
young a man, and one which promised a career of
great utility in the future had his life been spared.
Little more remains to be told. Sir Gerald had
suffered from repeated attacks of fever both in Uganda
and on the march, which, though never serious enough
to give rise to anxiety, were undoubtedly very trying
to a constitution already weakened by continuous
residence in a tropical climate. He had, however,
returned to Zanzibar in excellent health after his
arduous experiences on the homeward journey, and
he arrived in England in the last month of 1893
apparently strong and well in the full flush of success,
eagerly anticipating the delight of home and the en-
joyment of so much that he had been cut off from in
his adventurous march of some 2000 miles through
Equatorial Africa. Early in January he fell ill with
what appeared to be a relapse of African fever, but
after three weeks of varying phases the fatal signs
of typhoid became manifest, and his strength,
impaired as it was by a most trying climate, was
unequal to contending against the ravages of disease.
It was a hard fate for a man who had encountered so
many adventures, and passed so often through the fire,
to fall a victim to a sickness bred of city life ; and he
struggled bravely, as those who attended him bear
witness, in that last unequal battle. But the end
MEMOIR xlv
was near, and on the 26th of January the brief and
brilliant career was closed, and Gerald Portal passed
away from us, rich in the affection of many devoted
friends, and in the sorrow of all his countrymen.
His character may fairly be judged by the ensuing
record, and by the pages of the Keport which he
has submitted to Her Majesty's Government. The
qualities which marked him most, perhaps, were the
quickness with which he surveyed a given situation,
a rapidity of decision, and a dogged determination in
carrying out the line he had adopted. He was some-
what reserved by nature, and little inclined to discuss
matters on which he had assumed the full responsi-
bility, but he combined with this characteristic a
generous appreciation of the work of others, and was
staunchly loyal to his friends. Success had only
done him good, and taught him a wider tolerance,
and that passion to excel which had marked his
youth helped him to make up the ground he may
have somewhat neglected in early years, so that his
general knowledge of a wide range of subjects made
him the most agreeable of companions. At the same
time there existed in him a softer side, by right of
which he was a true lover of Nature, an ardent
admirer of all things beautiful — a quality which from
time to time finds voice in the following pao-es. He
was a man eminently qualified by the strength of his
personality, by his own natural inclination, and no
less by the power of sympathy which he possessed,
to carry out the Imperial policy with which his life
was associated. The men of his own time and aee
xlvi THE MISSION TO UGANDA
comrades at school, colleagues in his profession, and
contemporaries in the sister services, will mourn him
long and sincerely, while many of those who met him
only once or twice will hardly fail to preserve the
memory of a very winning smile.
Of his brother Raymond Portal something remains
to be said in its proper place. Of both of them much
has necessarily been left unsaid, but their own words
will help to fill the vacant spaces. It is not easy for
one who has grown up with them to write with the
reserve which is due, for the two graves are still quite
new, and there are many living for whom the pathos
of their story is very near to tears.
R. R.
PART I
B
RIPON FALLS.
From a sketch by C. WJvymper after a photograph by Colonel Rhodes.
[Seepage 139.
CHAPTER I
My appointment as H.M. Commissioner to Uganda — The staff of the
Mission — Equipment of the caravan — The main body despatched
to Kikuyu — A farewell state-visit to the Sultan of Zanzibar — We
start upon our journey on the 1st of January 1893.
The events which led to the despatch of a Mission to
examine and report on the state of affairs in Uganda
will still be fresh in every one's recollection. The
Imperial British East Africa Company, whose first
caravan, under the leadership of Messrs. Jackson and
Gedge, had arrived in that country in April 1890,
found, after some eighteen months' experience, that
the task of exercising a control over a province at
such a distance from the coast was beyond their
strength, and announced their intention of with-
drawing their officers and forces from the whole
region. Fearing that such a course would gravely
imperil the lives of the missionaries in Uganda, some
friends of the Church Missionary Society subscribed
£16,000 towards the expenses of administration, on
the condition that the Company would maintain
their forces and officers there for another year,
till the end of 1892. The offer was accepted by
the Directors of the Company, and the year was
THE MISSION TO UGANDA
spent in Uganda : the first part in a sanguinary
civil war, the remainder in efforts on the part of
the Company's local officials to re-establish peace
on a permanent basis. Nothing, however, occurred
to induce the Directors to reconsider their deter-
mination to evacuate the country, and towards the
end of 1892 the same problem, regarding the future
disposal of Uganda, which had been shelved for a
year by the munificent offering of the members of the
Church Missionary Society, presented itself for final
consideration and solution. Her Majesty's Govern-
ment determined not to interfere with the Company's
evacuation, but, in the hope of lessening the danger
to the lives of missionaries and others which would
be caused by a hurried retreat, and in order, at the
same time, to enable them to receive fuller informa-
tion as to the actual state of affairs in Equatorial
Africa, they consented to defray the Company's costs
of administration there for three months, from the
1st of January till the 31st of March 1893, and
at the same time to despatch a Commissioner to
Uganda to report upon the subject, and to suggest,
if possible, the " best means of dealing with the
country."
It was with great delight, not unmingled with
some dismay at the magnitude of the task and the
importance of the interests involved, that I received
the offer of this appointment on the last day of
November 1892. My next feeling was that the time
at my disposal for organising and equipping the
necessary caravan, and for reaching Uganda before
APPOINTMENT AS COMMISSIONER
the evacuation of the Company, was uncomfortably
short. The usual allowance for a caravan to travel
from the coast to Uganda was ninety days, and the
date of the Company's retreat from Uganda was
definitely fixed for the 31st of March, the 90th day
of the new year. Even if, therefore, I were to count
upon no more than to arrive in Uganda one day before
its evacuation, this would only leave me the short space
of one month for the recruitment of porters — who
have of late years become most difficult to obtain- —
and for their medical examination ; for the engagement
of officers of the staff, and for their journey of three
weeks from Europe to Zanzibar ; for the selection and
purchase of provisions, of equipment, of innumerable
articles of barter, such as cloth and cotton stuffs of
different qualities, beads of several sizes and kinds,
iron, copper, and brass wire, small chains, looking-
glasses and coloured handkerchiefs, of axes, bill-hooks,
intrenching tools, ropes, canvas, tents and their
equipment, medical stores, and, in short, of all the
thousand and one articles which may sound like
trifles and be easily overlooked at the coast, but the
absence of any one of which 800 miles in the interior
may be productive of serious inconvenience to the
whole caravan.
Concurrently with all this work of preparation,
innumerable outstanding questions had to be settled
in connection with the somewhat complicated system
of administration in Zanzibar, and the Sultan's assent
had to be obtained to my taking 200 of his partly-
drilled soldiers to serve both as escort on the
THE MISSION TO UGANDA
journey, and, if necessary, as a sort of police force in
Uganda itself. With regard to these soldiers, I may
at once confess that almost from the moment of
leaving the coast till the day of our return, I never
ceased to regret, in an ever-increasing; degree, the
unlucky moment in which I consented to inflict their
company on the Expedition. As events turned out
they were almost useless from start to finish, and yet,
in self-justification, it must be added that it was
impossible to foretell this in December 1892. No
one in Europe or on the African coast had any but
the vaguest ideas as to the numbers and nature of the
force which could be placed at our disposal in Uganda
on the retreat of the Company. We knew that the
Company had a certain number of excellent Soudanese
troops who had been recruited in Egypt a couple of
years before, but we were informed at the same time
that the period of service of these men had expired,
and that they would all have to leave Uganda with
the Company's officers. It was also reported that
some of the refugees from Emin Pacha's old province,
ex-soldiers of the Egyptian Government, had been
enlisted by the Company, but nobody could tell us
either the approximate number of these recruits or
the degree of efficiency which they had attained.
It was evidently necessary, not only that the
Commission should have complete liberty of move-
ment both before reaching Uganda and in that
country itself, but also that it should be throughout
in a position of absolute independence : it therefore
appeared expedient to cause it to be accompanied
STAFF OF THE MISSION
by at least 200 armed men with some knowledge
of the use of a rifle. Moreover, the Zanzibar soldiers
in their own town, with their clean white uniforms,
presented a most creditable appearance. On parade
they appeared fairly smart, they drilled in a way
that would put some English militia regiments to
shame, and they could go through the bayonet
exercise faultlessly. I confess, indeed, to having
often looked upon this Zanzibar force as a future
factor of some value in the eventual settlement of
the whole East African question. It was, therefore,
with real disappointment that I felt compelled, after
travelling some hundreds of miles in their company,
reluctantly to acquiesce in the unanimous verdict of
the other officers of the Mission, that these Zanzibar
soldiers were the laziest, the most hopelessly and
repulsively dirty, and the most untrustworthy collec-
tion of men with whom it had ever been our mis-
fortune to come in contact. 1
A few days after a telegram had been despatched
to London expressing my grateful thanks for the
honour wdiich had been done me in selecting me for
this task, a further message was received from H.M.
Secretary of State, informing me of the appointment
of the officers who were to accompany the Mission
to Uganda, These officers were : Colonel Rhodes,
D.S.O., Royal Dragoons, then Military Secretary to
H.E. the Governor of Bombay, who is well known
1 In consequence of these and other recent experiences, a new system of
recruiting is being introduced with a view to securing men of a better stamp. —
Ed.
THE MISSION TO UGANDA
for his distinguished services in two expeditions to
Suakim, and in the terrible fighting of the desert
column of the Gordon Relief Expedition, where he
served as A.D.C. to the late Sir Herbert Stewart, and
afterwards to Sir James Dormer, and who has,
moreover, gained renown both in the hunting and
in the cricket fields; Brigade -Major Owen, D.S.O.,
Lancashire Fusiliers, whose name is familiar in many
circles, both for conspicuous services rendered in a
recent expedition against the Jebus in West Africa,
and for innumerable laurels earned " between the
flag's " as the most consummate horseman and the
best gentleman rider of modern days ; Captain
Portal, my brother, of the Royal North Lancashire
Regiment, then Adjutant of the Mounted Infantry ;
and Lieutenant Arthur, Rifle Brigade, at that time
serving in the army of the Sultan of Zanzibar : this
officer was appointed specially to command the
escort of Zanzibar troops. To these were added
Mr. Ernest Berkeley, a Consul in H.M. service, who
had for the last year acted as Administrator of the
possessions of the Imperial British East Africa
Company at Mombasa ; Dr. R. Moffat, recently in
charge of a Scottish Industrial Mission at Kibwezi,
in British East Africa, whose services I was most
fortunate to secure as medical officer to the Mission ;
and Mr. Foaker, lately of the I.B.E.A. Company,
who had already made one journey to Uganda, and
was now to act as caravan leader, whose arduous duty
it was to superintend all details of the organisation
of porters, the weight and distribution of loads, the
STAFF OF THE MISSION
supply and distribution of rations, — in short, all the
innumerable and troublesome details connected with
the internal economy of a large caravan bound on a
long journey. Another valuable addition to our
strength was made later, in the person of Lieutenant
C. Villiers, Koyal Horse Guards, who happened to
have arrived about this time in East Africa with the
intention of starting on a private shooting expedition
into the interior, and who, in reply to his own
earnest solicitation, obtained, at the very last
moment, permission from the requisite authorities
to accompany us to Uganda. I should not forget to
add to these the name of my servant Hutchisson,
who at once volunteered to accompany me, and who,
in a journey with me through Abyssinia at the end
of 1887, had given ample proofs of his powers of
endurance, his resource and pluck, in some very
critical moments, and under circumstances of peculiar
discomfort and danger.
After the appointment of this staff, I could but
confess to myself that, so far as concerned the actual
journey and the work to be done, no expedition had
ever left the coast of East Africa with so good a
prospect of success, and that if we were destined to
meet with disaster, or to break down through any of
the countless accidents to which caravans in Eastern
and Central Africa are liable, not only the responsi-
bility but also the fault would lie with myself. Let
me add here a fact of which we may all be justly
proud, and to which, I fear, claim can be laid by very
few expeditions after a long journey in Equatorial
THE MISSION TO UGANDA
Africa, that not only did general good fellowship
reign throughout the journey, but that never on any
occasion was the harmony of the party disturbed by
a single squabble, by any jealousies, by any hasty or
ill-considered word, or even by a day's coolness
between any of the officers of the Expedition from
the moment of starting until, nearly ten months
later, some of us again saw the waters of the Indian
Ocean.
The first steps taken, in the early days of
December, were to select the soldiers who were to
accompany us, and to send forth emissaries in every
direction to recruit a sufficient number of porters.
The soldiers were a comparatively easy matter as
soon as the Sultan had kindly given his consent
to their employment in this manner. A call for
volunteers from among the battalion of 800
"regulars" produced immediately more than the
200 who were required, and the necessary selection
was easily made by the rejection of the weakest.
The remainder were then medically examined,
vaccinated, and equipped with two serviceable suits
of "khakee" tunic and knee-breeches, putties, and
two pairs of sandals each ; and every man carried a
Snider rifle, sword bayonet, and forty rounds of
ammunition. The precaution of causing every
member of the caravan to be vaccinated is one
which should always, when possible, be observed
by the leader of an expedition going into the interior
of Africa from the East Coast. There is scarcely a
single tribe between Mombasa and Uganda which is
PRECAUTIONS AGAINST SMALL-POX 13
ever quite free from the scourge of small-pox ; some-
times it does not make itself very conspicuous, while
at other times, especially after a period of drought,
scarcity, or, as at the present moment, of distress
caused by the death of all the cattle, it breaks out as
a veritable plague, and decimates the population of
immense districts. Few greater disasters can befall
a caravan than to get small -pox among the men,
as frequently happens when this precaution has
been omitted. If the first cases occur at a
station or in the neighbourhood of some village
whose inhabitants can be trusted not to cut the
throat of any defenceless stranger, the patients may
be left behind with no greater inconvenience than
the necessity of distributino; their loads anions other
already overburdened men ; but if an unfortunate
wretch is seized with the disease in some district far
from any human habitation, or tenanted only by the
murderous Masai, his chances are small indeed. The
caravan cannot wait : it has only rations for a limited
number of days, and must push on to the next food-
supplying district ; the man must be carried by two,
or perhaps four others, which means that three or
five loads must be either thrown away or added to
the burdens of their companions. The ruin which
therefore befalls a caravan if, as not unfrequently
happens, ten, fifteen, or twenty men are attacked
almost simultaneously may be better imagined than
described. And yet, although instances of such
disasters are numerous and well known, such are the
conservative and laisser-aller properties of the whole
i 4 THE MISSION TO UGANDA
atmosphere of East Africa, that not only does no rule
exist regarding the vaccination of porters, but I have
never even heard of this ordinary precaution having
been taken with any other caravan than my own
which has left Mombasa at any time during the last
three years.
Meanwhile the work of collecting porters was
proceeding but slowly, for several reasons. In the
first place, I had insisted on none but volunteers
being recruited. In the second place, the pro-
fessional porters are seldom keen to engage them-
selves for a very long journey, such as that to
Uganda. If we had been going to Mount Kilimanjaro,
to Jabora, or to Kikuyu, we could have secured as
many good men as we liked in a couple of days, but
the idea of Uganda rather frightens them : the road
is but little known, and they feel that it means a
long and wearisome journey, sometimes on very
short rations, and an absence of many months from
their homes at Zanzibar. In the third place, while
the supply of porters is diminishing every year, the
demand is growing ever larger.
It is a great mistake to suppose, as do most
Europeans when they arrive in Zanzibar to collect
a caravan for a journey or shooting expedition, that
any stalwart peasant or street loafer of Zanzibar will
make a good porter. Such a man would break down
in a week, whatever may be his physical strength.
He would infallibly get sore feet or cracked heels ;
the skin of his head or shoulders would be rubbed by
his load ; these sores would develop into serious ulcers,
CARAVAN PORTERS i 5
and after walking a hundred miles the man would either
have to be left at some friendly village, or would have
to hobble along with the caravan, doing no work and
eating precious food. The professional caravan porters
form a distinct clique by themselves. They spend
their whole lives in either travelling about the con-
tinent with loads on their heads, or in spending the
money thus amassed with all possible speed and with
reckless extravagance at Zanzibar. They are a cheery
lot, with heads like iron, feet like leather, and with
the stomachs of ostriches — miserable, like children, in
cold and wet districts, or in times when food is
scarce, but forgetting all their discomforts with the
first ray of sunshine, or with the first successful shot
at a rhinoceros, zebra, or other animal which will
supply them with meat. The life is a hard one, and
the professional caravan porter seldom lives to be an
old man, while the increased facilities now offered to
able-bodied men of earnino; a comfortable living at
Zanzibar or on the coast prevents younger men from
joining their ranks. The authorities of German East
Africa have long foreseen this difficulty, and have not
only employed many devices to attract all the Zanzibar
porters to take up their residence in German territory,
but have also enacted the most stringent, and, on the
whole, effective measures to prevent these men from
leaving the German colony. I shall have occasion to
return later to this question of porters and the means
of transport which must eventually replace them in
East Africa.
The number of men which we calculated would be
16 THE MISSION TO UGANDA
required for the Mission amounted to nearly 400, and
it may perhaps be of some use to future travellers if
I describe briefly the nature of the loads which made
this apparently large number necessary. To every
European officer were assigned ten men, two of whom
were to carry his tent, with its poles, pegs, etc.
These are heavy and awkward loads, especially in
wet weather, and should, when possible, be divided
into three. One man carried the bed and bedding,
and the remaining seven were available for boxes of
clothes, boots, scientific instruments, canteen, cooking-
pots, chair, table, guns, ammunition, and all the rest
of the officer's paraphernalia. As our party consisted
of nine European officers, this accounted for ninety
porters, to whom may be added four or five more who
carried the mess-tent and its appurtenances. To each
European was allowed one box of European provisions
per month : these boxes were not to exceed sixty-
five pounds in weight, including some fifteen pounds
for the box itself, which must necessarily be strong
and solid enough to withstand much dropping and
bumping and general ill-treatment. These were filled
with those necessaries of life which are not procurable
in the interior, such as tea, coffee, cocoa, salt, sugar,
oatmeal, rice, lime-juice, jam (a most necessary anti-
scorbutic), and a certain quantity of tinned meats.
In absolutely foodless districts, such as the greater
part of those through which the road to Uganda
passes, it was found that one such box per month
for each officer was very far from being a liberal or
unnecessary allowance. As we were preparing for an
NECESSARY BAGGAGE 17
absence of ten months, the European provisions for the
party of nine officers amounted to ninety more loads,
which were brought up to one hundred by medical
stores, medical comforts, and one or two " extras."
The soldiers were allowed ten porters for every com-
pany of fifty men, including officers ; their four
companies, therefore, absorbed forty porters, to whom
may be added about ten more for axes, intrenching
tools, small grindstone, ropes, etc.
Nearly eighty men were required to carry the
"currency" of the different countries through which
we had to pass, consisting of cotton cloth of several
different qualities and sizes, coloured handkerchiefs,