At this season of the year the long grass in the open
s all burnt, and the stifling experience of walk-
ing through eight or ten feet of grass and getting no
view whatsoever was spared us.
Shade for our midday halts was always precarious.
African trees have' the character of giving as little
shade as possible, and this we found to be invariably
the case. Luckily, water is everj^where abundant,
■and we could assuage our thirst with copious
draughts of tea. .
The native kraals on, this road are highly uninteresting;
the inhabitants are wanting altogether
in that artistic tendency displayed in Mashonaland,
-which showed itself in carved knives, snuff-boxes, and
■weapons. A chief named Bandula occupies a commanding
position on a high range which we passed
on our left, at the foot of which flows a stream called
the Lopodzi, which delighted us with its views over
the Nyangombwe Mountains, and offended us with
its swampy banks, where the frogs croaked as loud
as the caw of the rooks in our woods at home.
Chimoia s kraal is a sort of half-way halt, where
all waggons are now left before entering the much-
dreaded ‘ fly belt; ’ and here my wife parted reluctantly
with her horse, and transferred herself and
her saddle to the back of one of the three loose asses
which accompanied our cart. Most people seem to
have two, or three asses in their train, for fear of
being utterly helpless in case of the desertion of their
blacks, and all are prepared for their ultimate demise,
either by the violence of the lion or the bite of the
fly.‘ One ass at Chimoia’s distinguished itself by
seizing its master’s sugar-bag, and consuming it' and
its contents with all the greater avidity when the
master and his stick turned up. All laughed; but all
who had experienced the great calamity of being
without sugar in this land felt deep compassion for
the victim.
Chimoia’s is a scattered kraal, poor and destitute :
clusters of round huts with low eaves, and doors
through which one has to crawl on hands and
knees.
We could get no meal here, as everyone had told
us we should, and when talking ■ over our supplies
the faces of our men grew long and anxious ; and if
it had not been for the kindness of other white men
whom we met on our way down, famine would have
been added to our other discomforts; but good
fellowship and spontaneous liberality are the characteristics
of all those Englishmen who have been up
country, and at one time or another known what it is
to be without food. At Chimoia’s ends the pleasant
traffic in beads and cloth, which for months past had
kept our money in our pockets. Here a rupee is asked
for every commodity; and some day surprising
hoards of these coins will be found in the Kaffir
kraals near the coast, for they never spend them,
neither do they wear them as ornaments, and it is a
marvel to all what they do with them. The vegetation
is very fine around Chimoia’s, and the land
appears wonderfully fertile. On the top of a strangely
serrated ridge of mountains behind the village is a