They are richly painted with arabesques and pictures
on the panels; ‘Pungwe route to Mashonaland’ is
written thereon in letters of gold. The comfortable
cushions inside v are being moth-eaten, and the approaching
rains will complete the ruin of these
handsome but ill-fated vehicles. Meanwhile the
Portuguese stand by and laugh at the discomfiture of
their British rivals in the thirst for gold. Even the
signboard, with 4 To Mashonaland,’ is in its place ;
and all this elaborate preparation for the pioneer
route has been rendered abortive by that venomous
little insect the tsetse-fly. In his zeal to carry out his
contract, Major Johnson committed a great error and
entailed an enormous amount of misery when he
telegraphed that the Pungwe route was open, and
circulated advertisements to that effect, giving dates
and hours which were never carried out.
Heaps of people, for the most part poor and impecunious,
flocked to this entrance to their Eldorado,
and after waiting without anything and in abject
misery at Chimoia’s had to return to Mapanda’s,
where the condition of affairs was desperate—people
dying of fever, the doctor himself ill, and no
food, for the Portuguese governor of Neves Eerreira,
Colonel Madera, boycotted the English and forbade
the natives to bring them provisions. Assistance was
brought to them by Dr. Todd, of the Magicienne ; but
many died, and the rest, disappointed and penniless,
had to return to Capetown.
The River Pungwe is imposing at Sarmento, its bed
being nearly two hundred yards across, and the view
of the reaches up and down from the verandah where
the Portuguese governor has his meals al fresco is
fairly striking. But the Pungwe is imposing nowhere
else where we saw it, being a filthy, muddy stream,
flowing between mangrove swamps, relieved occasionally
by a tall palm and villages on piles; the
surroundings are perfectly flat, and its repulsive
waters were until lately plied only by the tree canoes
of the natives. Crocodiles and hippopotami revel in
its muddy waters, and on its banks game is abundant
enough to satisfy the most ardent sportsman. Deer
of every conceivable species are to be seen still quietly
grazing within shot of the ro ad ; buffaloes, zebras,
lions, hyenas, wild pigs, nay, even the elephant, may
be found in this corner of the world. Disappointed
as the sportsman may have been with the results
of his exploits in Mashonaland and the high veldt, he
will be amply rewarded for the fatigues of his journey
to Beira by finding himself in a country which would
appear to produce all the kinds of wild animals that
came to Adam for their names. One herd of zebra,
numbering about fifty, stood staring at us so long,
at a distance of not more than a hundred yards, that
we were able to photograph them twice. The flesh of
the zebra is eatable, and we, with our limited larder,
greatly enjoyed a zebra steak when one was shot. A
little, farther on a gnu, or blue hartebeest, as the
Dutchmen call it, stood and contemplated us with
almost as much curiosity as we manifested in seeing
him so near our path. But, for my part, no amount of
game or quaint tropical sights would compensate for