land luxuriant in verdure, on whose vast tracts of fertile*
well-watered soil the richest crops of golden fruit may rise,
ripening under the genial influence of a cloudless sun ?
Let the intending colonist go and look at the country,
and he will find with a vengeance that he has
“ To force the churlish soil for scanty bread.”
As a dupe of misrepresentation, he will search long for the
wealth, agricultural and mineral, which is scattered through
these regions of intense drought, and his capital will quickly
disappear when he, perforce, begins to fertilize the land
with his “ lung-sick ” cattle. When his money is expended,
those who sent him out will be deaf to remonstrances, and
the whole failure will he attributed to his lassitude and
inability to grasp a golden opportunity.
Irrigation is the magic word shouted by every enthusiastic
coloniser. Like the bottle of the charlatan, it means
a cure for every evil. The actual significance of the word
is ignored. The source of supply, of necessity the principal
consideration in. such a scheme, is never mentioned, not to
speak of being indicated. The water is to be dammed, hut
there is no mention made of the class of dams, of their construction
or their probable cost. Of course irrigation can be
effected, hut we must have rivers that will afford an abundant
supply of water; then we must have suitable soil and
contour, not too much rooting to he done, and a land adapted
to ditching.
Now we find the nomadic tribes of Masarwa bushmen
who rove in search of the solitary duiker, cooling their
parched tongues by sucking through hollow reeds from the
brooks beneath the sands. These inhabitants, as is well
known, are stunted in growth, the dirt of years forms their
covering, the bow and. its bone-tipped arrow is their weapon,
and wild grasses of the desert, thrown over bent boughs and
saplings, shield them from the storm. Yet they are Nature s
free men, for their land may be coveted, but it cannot be
inhabited, by aliens. The rivers are sluggish, and are
slowly but surely silting.
Remembering the long list of sicknesses to which domestic
animals are liable, the vast tracts of unpeopled country,
where the duiker and the steinbuck are the only species of
game that can exist (their habit being to roam far from
water), the scantiness of nutritious grasses, the boundless
stretches of worthless bush and stunted forest, the long,
winding belts of arid, yellow sand which mark the courses
of once-flowing rivers-—I say that, remembering all these
features, there can be no doubt that they indelibly stamp
the country as a great thirst land, a region lost to mankind.
Soon, however, we came to a fine hunting country, where
giraffes abounded, also harte-beest (Alcelaphus caama) and
zebras (Burchell), and where flocks of guinea-fowl and
coveys of Namaqua partridges were seen.
Selous and myself bathed in the shallow pools of the
river and in small vleis of the forest. The deeper pools
were dangerous, on account of the crocodile.
The Shashi river was crossed on the 13th of April. I t is
said to be the dividing line between the countries of Lo-
bengula and Khania, but I believe there is some ground
north of the river which is claimed by both sides. Practically,
however, it is ruled by Lo-bengula. We left the
waggons here, and rode ahead. Now we were in Matabeli-
land.