The Baganda (people of Buganda; sing., Muganda),…

The Baganda (people of Buganda; sing., Muganda), consolidating their efforts behind a centralized kingship, have shifted away from defensive strategies and toward expansion.

By the mid-nineteenth century, Buganda has doubled and redoubled its territory.

Newly conquered lands are placed under chiefs nominated by the king.

Buganda's armies and the royal tax collectors travel swiftly to all parts of the kingdom along specially constructed roads that cross streams and swamps by bridges and viaducts.

On Lake Victoria (which the Baganda call Nnalubale), a royal navy of outrigger canoes, commanded by an admiral who is chief of the Lungfish clan, can transport Baganda commandos to raid any shore of the lake.

The journalist Henry M. Stanley visits Buganda in 1875 and provides an estimate of Buganda's troop strength.

Stanley counts one hundred and twenty-five thousand troops marching off on a single campaign to the east, where a fleet of two hundred and thirty war canoes waits to act as auxiliary naval support.