that no white man should run off with any part of his
bodily frame. He was a morose creature this. On one
occasion I had with difficulty disarmed him, when he had
drawn his knife and rushed at one of the boys with the
evident intention of killing him. This was the only time
in all my experiences in Africa that I saw any attempt at
life-taking among the natives, irrespective of their bloodcurdling
execution scenes.
A south-easterly course was now pursued. For some
hours we went down the bed of the Hake river.
Towns were seen at short intervals all along the banks.
At one of these we stopped to try and make a trade for
pigeons.
A tremendous fuss ensued. The men came out to barter,
and the women remained inside, for we were close to the
small town with its cane fence. From behind the fence
the wives of the traders generally sent out shouts of infuriated
remonstrance against the short-sighted bargains of
their husbands. The better halves did well in this way.
When one of them heard of the arrangement her lord and
master was making, she volubly sent to his ears a string of
epithets, none of which would have been his choice for
a personal description of himself.
The maligned man would then turn round and, looking
as angry and as indignant as he possibly could, he would
retort in screaming tones that he was doing his utmost to
screw another quarter of a yard from the Mzungo; if she
would only be quiet he would make a better bargain than
she herself was capable of doing. After two or three
volleys of dreadful and piercing words from inside the
fence, the bargain was at length concluded.
The handling of the birds was a very rough operation.
Feathers were torn out and were flying in all directions.
The poor pigeons were dashed roughly into an almost airtight
bag, which was immediately closed up. I thought
that the place would be a likely outpost for the Society for
the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
Arriving at the town of Daingi, I stopped to interview a
man gorgeously robed in calico of many colours. Properly
speaking, he came out to interview me. He inquired where
X was bound for, and on being told that I was going to
cross the Zambesi and proceed to the Lake regions, he
expressed much astonishment, and said:
« Oh, you travel very far. I have never seen a man so
white as you.”
I asked him how many days he considered the journey
from here to Kunyungwi, and he replied about five. Of
the Lake regions he knew nothing. Before proceeding on
our journey he presented me with a goat.*
Here we left the Dake river. Southward the Vunga
hills were visible in the evening lig h t; but it was not until
long after dark that we reached a suitable camping-place.
Water was very scarce. Since leaving Chibinga we had
been blessed with much cooler weather. Eelief was found
under cloudy skies, very different from the previous incessant
and roasting blaze of the torrid sun.
Masecha was the next town we arrived at. I t was the
dirtiest and most wretched little place which I had yet
seen. The inhabitants appeared to be thriftless and
slovenly. They wore no ornaments, not even the universal
beads, and their whole garb consisted of a very dirty piece
of cloth passed over the loins. They seemed poorly fed,
and were in very bad condition.
While returning from our evening ramble, during which
I had been on the look-out for guinea-fowl, I met a long
* Goats were numerous here, the place not being in a tsetse fly belt.