sure must flow at the foot of these hills. We were
walking through some high grass, when what was my
astonishment to find an enormous mass of water at my
feet.
The Zambezi ! At last I had arrived, not without
difficulty; but still I had accomplished what I had said I
would.
The river flows between low banks fringed with high
grass. On my left was the Linyanti, which here throws
itself into the Zambezi. The two bodies of water at
this point are about the same size, nearly seven hundred
yards across. Between the two lies the island of Mpalera,
on which were growing some palm trees, sole indication of
tropical vegetation. I might easily have fancied myself
on the banks of the Seine in Normandy if it had not been
for a crocodile- that was playfully sporting in the middle
of the stream. On the other side of the river appeared
the huts of the French Evangelical Mission. That very
morning, when leaving camp, a native messenger whom
I had sent from Pandamatenga to the missionaries
announcing my'arrival, gave me a letter from M. Jaffa,
chief of the mission, bidding me welcome and asking me
to fire a gun to announce my arrival. I therefore discharged
my rifle several times, and shortly afterwards
was answered from the other bank. After waiting half
an hour I perceived a boat crossing the river; it was
hollowed out of a tree, and was propelled by three rowers,
standing up, fore and aft. At last it reached me, and
a young Frenchman, M. Vollet — a recently - arrived
missionary—bade me welcome, explaining M. Jaffa’s
regret that he was unable, through indisposition, to come
himself. He also told me that I could not cross that day,
for the country was very unsettled, and the natives very
sensitive, adding that M. Jaffa had been forced to send to
Shesheke to ask the chief’s permission for me to enter the
country. Meanwhile I installed myself in a native hut
belonging to a native hunter, another of Westbeach’s old
60
men, who had settled down there after his master’s
death.
I will here give an extract from my diary:—“ So here
I am on the Zambezi, in that part of Central Africa that
for so many years I had been longing to visit. After all,
a journey in Central Africa is not so very terrible. It
is very monotonous; you must be endowed with an inexhaustible
fund of patience and a good stomach. You
MY HOUSE ON TH E ZAMBEZI. (See page 63.)
must be ready to put feelings of disgust aside, to drink
water more or less putrid, to eat no matter what, to go
very often without meat, salt and sugar, to remain days
together without washing, to sleep whole nights in the
water, and frequently to remain for twenty or thirty hours
without a shred of dry clothing on you. If you make up
your mind to the worst you won’t be disappointed.
You must get accustomed to live from day to day
without trying to know what will happen on the morrow,
61