Kija, described as a sporting-field, where elephants, hippopotami,
and buffalo are hunted by the occupants of
both sides of the river. The elephant is killed with a
new kind of spear, with a double-edged blade a yard long,
and a handle which, weighted in any way most easy, is
pear-shaped.
With these instruments in their hands, some men climb
into trees and wait for the herd to pass, whilst others
drive them under. The hippopotami, however, are not
hunted, but snared with lunda, the common tripping-trap
with spike-drop, which is placed in the runs of this animal,
described by every South African traveller, and
generally known as far as the Hametic language is
spread. The Kariima Falls, if such they may be called,
T h e JECaiunia F a lls—Elidi.
are a mere sluice or rush of water between high syenitic
stones, falling in a long slope down a ten-feet drop. There
are others of minor importance, and one within ear-sound,
down the river, said to be very grand.
The name given to the Kariima Falls arose from the
absurd belief that Karuma, the agent or familiar of a
certain great spirit, placed the stones that break the
waters in the river, and, for so doing, was applauded by
his master, who, to reward his services by an appropriate
distinction, allowed the stones to be called Kariima.. Near
this is a tree which contains a spirit whose attributes for
gratifying the powers and pleasures of either men or
women who summon its influence in the form appropriate
to each, appear to be almost identical with that of Maha-
cleo’s Ligna in India.
20th.—We halted for the men to collect and lay in a
store of food for the passage of the Kidi wilderness. Presents
of fish, caught in baskets, were sent us by Kija.
They were not bad eating, though all ground animals of
the lowest order. At the Grand Falls below this,'Kidg-
wiga informs us, the king had the heads of one hundred
men, prisoners taken in war against Kionga, cut off and
thrown 'into the river.
21st and 22d.—The governor, who would not let us go
until we saw him, called on the 22d with a large retinue,
attended by a harpist, and bringing a present of one cow,
two loads flour, and three pots of pombe. He expected
a chair to sit upon, and got a box, as at home he has a
throne only a little inferior to Kamrasi’s. He was very
generous to Bombay on his former journey to Gani; .and
then said he thought the white men were all flocking this
way to retake their lost country; for tradition recorded
that the Wahiima were once half-black and half-white,
with half the hair straight and the other half curly; and
how was this to be accounted for, unless the country
formerly belonged to white men with straight hair, but
was subsequently taken by black men ? We relieved his
apprehensions by telling him his ancestors were formerly
all white, with straight hair, and lived in a country beyond
the salt sea, till they crossed that sea, took posses