Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - David Livingstone (best romantic books to read .TXT) 📗

which I saw only once in the Bakwain country. Though small, it was hideous, being colored jet black, with vermilion spots.

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The discovery of this last species is thus mentioned by that accomplished naturalist, Dr. Smith: "On the banks of the Limpopo River, close to the tropic of Capricorn, a massive tree was cut down to obtain wood to repair a wagon. The workman, while sawing the trunk longitudinally nearly along its centre, remarked, on reaching a certain point, `It is hollow, and will not answer the purpose for which it is wanted.'

He persevered, however, and when a division into equal halves was effected, it was discovered that the saw in its course had crossed a large hole, in which were five specimens of the species just described, each about an inch in length. Every exertion was made to discover a means of communication between the external air and the cavity, but without success. Every part of the latter was probed with the utmost care, and water was kept in each half for a considerable time, without any passing into the wood. The inner surface of the cavity was black, as if charred, and so was likewise the adjoining wood for half an inch from the cavity. The tree, at the part where the latter existed, was 19 inches in diameter; the length of the trunk was 18 feet. When the Batrachia above mentioned were discovered, they appeared inanimate, but the influence of a warm sun to which they were subjected soon imparted to them a moderate degree of vigor.

In a few hours from the time they were liberated they were tolerably active, and able to move from place to place apparently with great ease."

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Before reaching the Makondo rivulet, latitude 13d 23' 12" S., we came upon the tsetse in such numbers that many bites were inflicted on my poor ox, in spite of a man with a branch warding them off.

The bite of this insect does not affect the donkey as it does cattle.

The next morning, the spots on which my ox had been bitten were marked by patches of hair about half an inch broad being wetted by exudation.

Poor Sinbad had carried me all the way from the Leeba to Golungo Alto, and all the way back again, without losing any of his peculiarities, or ever becoming reconciled to our perversity in forcing him away each morning from the pleasant pasturage on which he had fed. I wished to give the climax to his usefulness, and allay our craving for animal food at the same time; but my men having some compunction, we carried him to end his days in peace at Naliele.

Having dispatched a message to our old friend Manenko, we waited a day opposite her village, which was about fifteen miles from the river.

Her husband was instantly dispatched to meet us with liberal presents of food, she being unable to travel in consequence of a burn on the foot.

Sambanza gave us a detailed account of the political affairs of the country, and of Kolimbota's evil doings, and next morning performed the ceremony called "Kasendi", for cementing our friendship. It is accomplished thus: The hands of the parties are joined (in this case Pitsane and Sambanza were the parties engaged); small incisions are made on the clasped hands, on the pits of the stomach of each, and on the right cheeks and foreheads.

A small quantity of blood is taken off from these points in both parties by means of a stalk of grass. The blood from one person is put into a pot of beer, and that of the second into another; each then drinks the other's blood, and they are supposed to become perpetual friends or relations. During the drinking of the beer, some of the party continue beating the ground with short clubs, and utter sentences by way of ratifying the treaty. The men belonging to each then finish the beer. The principals in the performance of "Kasendi" are henceforth considered blood-relations, and are bound to disclose to each other any impending evil. If Sekeletu should resolve to attack the Balonda, Pitsane would be under obligation to give Sambanza warning to escape, and so on the other side. They now presented each other with the most valuable presents they had to bestow. Sambanza walked off with Pitsane's suit of green baize faced with red, which had been made in Loanda, and Pitsane, besides abundant supplies of food, obtained two shells similar to that I had received from Shinte.

On one occasion I became blood-relation to a young woman by accident.

She had a large cartilaginous tumor between the bones of the fore-arm, which, as it gradually enlarged, so distended the muscles as to render her unable to work. She applied to me to excise it.

I requested her to bring her husband, if he were willing to have the operation performed, and, while removing the tumor, one of the small arteries squirted some blood into my eye. She remarked, when I was wiping the blood out of it, "You were a friend before, now you are a blood-relation; and when you pass this way, always send me word, that I may cook food for you." In creating these friendships, my men had the full intention of returning; each one had his `Molekane' (friend) in every village of the friendly Balonda. Mohorisi even married a wife in the town of Katema, and Pitsane took another in the town of Shinte.

These alliances were looked upon with great favor by the Balonda chiefs, as securing the good-will of the Makololo.

In order that the social condition of the tribes may be understood by the reader, I shall mention that, while waiting for Sambanza, a party of Barotse came from Nyenko, the former residence of Limboa, who had lately crossed the Leeba on his way toward Masiko.

The head man of this party had brought Limboa's son to his father, because the Barotse at Nyenko had, since the departure of Limboa, elected Nananko, another son of Santuru, in his stead; and our visitor, to whom the boy had been intrusted as a guardian, thinking him to be in danger, fled with him to his father. The Barotse, whom Limboa had left behind at Nyenko, on proceeding to elect Nananko, said, "No, it is quite too much for Limboa to rule over two places."

I would have gone to visit Limboa and Masiko too, in order to prevent hostilities, but the state of my ox would not allow it.

I therefore sent a message to Limboa by some of his men, protesting against war with his brother, and giving him formal notice that the path up the Leeba had been given to us by the Balonda, the owners of the country, and that no attempt must ever be made to obstruct free intercourse.

On leaving this place we were deserted by one of our party, Mboenga, an Ambonda man, who had accompanied us all the way to Loanda and back.

His father was living with Masiko, and it was natural for him to wish to join his own family again. He went off honestly, with the exception of taking a fine "tari" skin given me by Nyamoana, but he left a parcel of gun-flints which he had carried for me all the way from Loanda. I regretted parting with him thus, and sent notice to him that he need not have run away, and if he wished to come to Sekeletu again he would be welcome.

We subsequently met a large party of Barotse fleeing in the same direction; but when I represented to them that there was a probability of their being sold as slaves in Londa, and none in the country of Sekeletu, they concluded to return. The grievance which the Barotse most feel is being obliged to live with Sekeletu at Linyanti, where there is neither fish nor fowl, nor any other kind of food, equal in quantity to what they enjoy in their own fat valley.

A short distance below the confluence of the Leeba and Leeambye we met a number of hunters belonging to the tribe called Mambowe, who live under Masiko. They had dried flesh of hippopotami, buffaloes, and alligators. They stalk the animals by using the stratagem of a cap made of the skin of a leche's or poku's head, having the horns still attached, and another made so as to represent the upper white part of the crane called jabiru (`Mycteru Senegalensis'), with its long neck and beak above.

With these on, they crawl through the grass; they can easily put up their heads so far as to see their prey without being recognized until they are within bow-shot. They presented me with three fine water-turtles,*

one of which, when cooked, had upward of forty eggs in its body.

The shell of the egg is flexible, and it is of the same size at both ends, like those of the alligator. The flesh, and especially the liver, is excellent. The hunters informed us that, when the message inculcating peace among the tribes came to Masiko, the common people were so glad at the prospect of "binding up the spears", that they ran to the river, and bathed and plunged in it for joy. This party had been sent by Masiko to the Makololo for aid to repel their enemy, but, afraid to go thither, had spent the time in hunting.

They have a dread of the Makololo, and hence the joy they expressed when peace was proclaimed. The Mambowe hunters were much alarmed until my name was mentioned. They then joined our party, and on the following day discovered a hippopotamus dead, which they had previously wounded. This was the first feast of flesh my men had enjoyed, for, though the game was wonderfully abundant, I had quite got out of the way of shooting, and missed perpetually.

Once I went with the determination of getting so close that I should not miss a zebra. We went along one of the branches that stretch out from the river in a small canoe, and two men, stooping down as low as they could, paddled it slowly along to an open space near to a herd of zebras and pokus.

Peering over the edge of the canoe, the open space seemed like a patch of wet ground, such as is often seen on the banks of a river, made smooth as the resting-place of alligators. When we came within a few yards of it, we found by the precipitate plunging of the reptile that this was a large alligator itself. Although I had been most careful to approach near enough, I unfortunately only broke the hind leg of a zebra.

My two men pursued it, but the loss of a hind leg does not prevent this animal from a gallop. As I walked slowly after the men on an extensive plain covered with a great crop of grass, which was `laid' by its own weight, I observed that a solitary buffalo, disturbed by others of my own party, was coming to me at a gallop. I glanced around, but the only tree on the plain was a hundred yards off, and there was no escape elsewhere.

I therefore cocked my rifle, with the intention of giving him a steady shot in the forehead when he should come within three or four yards of