To-day you may book your passage with Cook's, in Ludgate Circus, to the
Victoria Falls and back, and travel in comfort all the way. In 1897 it
was different. There was no road to the Victoria Falls then, let alone a
railway. I won't bother you with an account of our journey out by waggon
as far as Panda-Ma-Tenga, or of how we rode across country from the edge
of the Kalahari Desert to the Falls, guided by the column of spray
arising from them, or, where the land dipped, by a sense of direction.
At length we got there, or, more correctly, within a hundred yards of
the tumbling waters. Their roar was deafening. It was a wonderful sound
and a more wonderful sight. Imagine the hum of London traffic increased
ten thousand fold. Imagine a forest of palm, fern, black-trunked trees,
all within a hothouse of immense proportions, and a tepid, tropical rain
soaking you to the skin. We cut through the distance which separated us
from the lip of the Falls. Thick, tough creeper and undergrowth,
maidenhair fern waist high; it seemed a sin to trample it underfoot.
From time to time up to the thigh in watery mud when, unluckily, one
stepped in the pit-like spoor of a hippopotamus which had passed in the
night. Monkeys chattering from overhead. I think I caught sight of a
buffalo.
What a difference to-day! You might see a monkey in the trees now and
then, but a fire has since passed through that jungle at the end of a
dry season, and a century will not repair the damage. Moreover, there
are gravel paths leading from the new hotel to every "view" now, but we,
who saw the Victoria Falls twenty-four years ago, have something to
remember and to brag about.
We spent half a day looking and looking and looking. We were drenched by
the spray, dried by the sun, deafened by the roar of the waters, and
struck dumb by the beauty of it all.
At about one o'clock we felt hungry, and went in search of our
pack-horses. We had off-saddled outside the thicket and turned our
beasts loose. We found our saddles easily enough, and the horses, too,
for that matter; the grass was so luscious and plentiful that no horse
would desire to stray far after several weeks in the dry Kalahari. We
had lunch and a little rest, and then set out again to do more
exploring. We hadn't gone far before we came upon the track of a waggon.
Robinson Crusoe, when he found the footprint of the man Friday, could
not have been more amazed than we.
So far as we knew, no other expedition had come to the Falls ahead of
us. Who, then, was the intruder?
We followed the track, and presently, in a small clearing, we saw a
waggon. Whoever he was, this traveller deserved full credit for what he
had done. We had ridden to the Falls, and were proud of it, but here was
a man who had got a waggon through. Stout fellow. And there, seated on a
skin near his oxen, was the man. He had a matted beard, and didn't look
too clean. Under one arm he hugged a huge calabash, from which he was
eating honey with a stick. The honey was old and granulated. There were
many flies in it, too, evidence that the neck of the calabash had been
left uncovered at times. He didn't move when he saw us, but, holding out
his stick, said: "Have some."
We told him we had just fed, but thanked him all the same.
"Sit down," said he, "sit on this skin," but he made no room for us. "I
shot it yesterday at the Falls. This is the cub; the lioness went off."
"How long have you been here?"
"A couple of days."
"How did you get through?"
"Cut my way."
"Lose any cattle in the thirst country?"
"Didn't come that way; took a bee line from Bulawayo."
This was a good performance indeed. All the old hands had said it
couldn't be done.
"What did you come for?"
"What did you?"
The man who asked the question first was travelling north to take over
the administration of a tract of country as big as France. He explained
his business.
"Oh, so you're the magistrate, are you?"
"Yes, that's about it. And you?"
"I'm a captain in the Salvation Army down south, but I've brought a
fellow up to prospect for mineral on the other side of the Zambesi. He
crossed yesterday, and moved up country on foot this morning."
I looked at this queer fellow with interest. His cap of calling lay on
the ground beside him. Throughout the conversation he went on eating
the honey. The Zambesi in those days was about the last place I should
have expected to find a Salvation Army man. Looking round I caught sight
of the familiar red jersey with the yellow letters. It was hanging on a
bush, evidently drying. The captain had followed my gaze, and
volunteered: "Had a bit of a washing day, first on this trip." From the
look of him I concluded that his own turn was yet to come.
"Well, tell us about the lion cub."
I think he told the truth. I can't, of course, vouch for it, but he was
sitting on the skin of a newly-killed cub. Before we left the Falls the
vultures told us where to find the lioness. But this is his story:
"I was walking along in the rain-forest with my rifle, looking for a pig
or a palla or anything else eatable. I hadn't gone far when I nearly
fell over this cub. He snarled at me, so I shot him. While he lay
kicking on his back up comes his mother, so I reloaded my old Martini
and gave her one for herself. Not being a first-class shot, I didn't do
for her right off. She looked so angry and seemed to be coming on that I
stepped back a pace or two, but keeping my eye on her. I tried to
reload, but the empty cartridge case jammed. I broke off a stick from a
handy bush and plugged it down the muzzle. I must have pushed too hard,
for the stick broke off short."
The captain stopped, got up, and fetched his rifle from the wagon. The
stick was still in the barrel, evidently stuck fast in the cartridge,
which, in its turn, was firmly fixed in the breech. We had a look at the
rifle and then at the captain. He simply said: "Can either of you
gentlemen fix this up for me?" We both said we could, and both asked:
"But what about the lioness?"
"Oh, the lioness. Why, there she was and there I was. She with a very
ugly look, and growling, and I with my rifle put out of action. I felt
it was time to do something, so I backed out of the bush singing a hymn
in a loud voice."