be cleared of corpses, caught by the floats during the night.
For seores of miles the entire population of the yalley was
swept away by this scourge Mariano, who is again, as he was
before, the great Portuguese slave-agent. I t made the heart
ache to see the wide-spread desolation; the river-banks,
once so populous, all silent; the villages burned down, and
an oppressive stillness reigning where formerly crowds of
eager sellers appeared with the various products of their
industry. Here and there might be seen on the bank a small
dreary deserted shed, where had sat, day after day, a starving
fisherman, until the rising waters drove the fish from their
wonted haunts, and left him to die. Tingane had been
defeated ; his people had been killed, kidnapped, and forced
to flee from their villages. There were a few wretched survivors
in a village above the Euo; but the majority of the
population was dead. The sight and smell of dead bodies
was everywhere. Many skeletons lay beside the path, where
in their weakness they had fallen and expired. Ghastly
living forms of boys and girls, with dull dead eyes, were
crouching beside some of the huts. A few more miserable
days of their terrible hunger, and they would be with the
dead.
Oppressed with the shocking scenes around, we visited the
Bishop’s grave; and though it matters little where a good
Christian’s ashes rest, yet it was with sadness that we thought
over the hopes which had clustered around him, as he left the
classic grounds of Cambridge, all now buried in this wild place.
How it would have torn his kindly heart to witness the sights
we now were forced to see!
In giving vent to the natural feelings of regret, that a
man so eminently endowed and learned, as was Bishop Mackenzie,
should have been so soon cut off, some have expressed
an opinion that it was wrong to use an instrument so
valuable merely to convert the heathen. If the attempt is
to be made at all, it is “ penny wise and pound foolish ” to
employ any but the very best men, and those who are
specially educated for the work. An ordinary clergyman,
however well suited for a parish, will not, without special
training, make a Missionary; and as to their comparative
usefulness, it is like that of the man who builds an hospital, as
compared vyith that of the surgeon who in after years only
administers for a time the remedies which the founder had
provided in perpetuity. Had the Bishop succeeded in introducing
Christianity, his converts might have been few, but
they would have formed a continuous roll for all time to come.
The Shire fell two feet, before we reached the shallow
crossing where we had formerly such difficulty, and we had
now two ships to take up. A hippopotamus was shot two
miles above a bank on which the ship lay a fortnight: it
floated in three hours. As the boat was towing it down, the
crocodiles were attracted by the dead beast, and several shots
had to be fired to keep them off. The bullet had not entered
the brain of the animal, but driven a splinter of bone into it.
A little moisture with some gas issued from the wound, and
this was all that could tell the crocodiles down the stream
of a dead hippopotamus; and yet they came up from miles
below. Their sense of smell must be as acute as their
hearing; both are quite extraordinary. Dozens fed on the
meat we left. Our Krooman, Jumbo, used to assert, that
the crocodile never eats fresh meat, but always keeps it till
it is high and tender—and the stronger it smells, the better
he likes it. There seems to be some truth in this. They
can swallow but small pieces at a time, and find it difficult
to tear fresh meat. In the act of swallowing, which is like
that of a dog, the head is raised out of the water. We
tried to catch some, and one was soon hooked; it required half-
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