firstly, the Crown colony to the south, with its railway,'
its well-to-do settlements at Taungs, Vryberg,
and Mafeking, and with its native chiefs confined
within certain limits ; secondly, the British protec-
, torate to the north of this over such chiefs as Batuen,
Pilan, Linchwe, and Sechele, extending vaguely to
the west into the Kalahari Desert, and bounded by
the Limpopo Biver and the Dutchmen on the east ;
thirdly, the independent dominions of the native
chief Khama, who rules over a vast territory to the
north, and whose interests are entirely British, for
with their assistance only can he hope to resist the
attacks of his inveterate foe King Lobengula of
Matabeleland.
Two roads through Bechuanaland to Mashonaland
were open to us from Mafeking : the shorter one is
by the river, which, after the rains, is muddy and
fever-stricken ; thè other is longer and less frequented
; it passes through a corner of the Kalahari
Desert, and had the additional attraction of taking
us through the capitals of all the principal chiefs :
consequently, we unhesitatingly chóse it, and it is
this which I now propose to describe.
We may dismiss the Crown colony of Bechuanaland
with a few words. It differs little from any
other such colony in South Africa, and the natives
and their chiefs have little or no identity left to them.
Even the once famous Montsoia, chief of the Ba-rolo,ngs
of Mafeking, has sunk into the lowest depths of
servile submission ; he recéives a monthly pension of
251., which said sum he always puts under his pillow
and sleeps upon ; he is avaricious in his old age, and
dropsical, and surrounded by women who delight to
wrap their swarthy frames in gaudy garments from
Europe. He is nominally a Christian, and has been
made an E.O.S., or Priend of Ally Sloper, and, as the
latter title is more in accordance with his tastes, he
points with pride to the diploma which hangs on the
walls of his hut.
From Mafeking to Kanya, the capital of Batuen,
chief of the Ba-Ngwatetse tribe, is about eighty miles.
At first the road is treeless, until the area is reached
where terminates the cutting down of timber for the
support of the diamond mines g,t Kimberley, a process
which has denuded all southern Bechuanaland
of trees, and is gradually creeping north. The rains
were not over when we started, and we found the
road saturated with moisture; and in two days, near
the Kamatlabama Liver, our progress was just one
mile, in which distance our waggons had to be unloaded
and dug out six times. But Bechuanaland
dries quickly, and in a fortnight after this we had
nothing to drink but concentrated mud, which made
our tea and coffee so similar that it was impossible
to tell the difference.
On one occasion during our midday halt we had
all our oxen inoculated with the virus of the lmmC
1
sickness, for this fatal malady was then raging in
Khama s country. Our waggons were placed side
by side, and with an ingenious contrivance of thongs
our conductor and driver managed to fasten the
plunging animals by the horns, whilst a string steeped