Final start from Tati--Bushman remains--A game-drive--Wild
dogs--The Makalakas again--The Matengwe River--English
hunters met with--The Nata River--The Pantamatenka--Christmas
Day--Start on foot for the Zambesi--The goal at last.
The country first passed through on leaving Tati was now fresh and
green, with abundance of water along the road. Their first evening the
party halted at “Mopani Pan,” a small pond full of reeds and surrounded
by tall mopani trees, a few miles from Tati. This pond is a favourite
halting-place for travellers between the Tati and Ramaqueban Rivers,
but soon becomes dry in the winter season. Here the party remained four
days, hunting; troops of quagga, blue wildebeest, and waterbuck being
met with. The veldt about here, though stony and for the most part very
bare of vegetation, produced some fine white lilies, now in bloom.
[Illustration: CAMP IN THE VELDT.]
Advancing again, on November 7th, to the Ramaqueban, they proceeded
slowly up that river, and halted again for a short time four days
afterwards, at the point where Frank Oates had stopped to hunt when
here the previous August,--the point at which the road for the Zambesi
turns off from the Ramaqueban again towards the Tati. Here the latter
had now a hut of branches made by the boys for himself to lie in, as
the heat in the waggon was insufferable. This was some relief from
the usual state of things experienced about this time. “The flies,”
he writes one day at this encampment, “are perfectly maddening. One
wakes early, when it is comparatively cool, looking forward without
much pleasure to the coming day of heat and discomfort--no comfortable
spot to retire to from the heat, and every place dirty and crowded.
How different,” he concludes, “from the luxuries experienced in some
hot countries!” Here, on one occasion, his boys brought him some fine
barbel, taken in the river, which proved delicious eating when rolled
in meal and fried in fat and oil.
On the 13th, whilst still at the same point, Frank Oates’s old ally,
Van Roozen, arrived with Piet Jacobs, the Dutchman, from the direction
of the Makalakas, the former of whom tried, it appears, to dissuade
his late employer from attempting the Zambesi at the present season, a
notion he was evidently by this time seriously entertaining.
Both these Dutchmen, as it chanced, were acquainted with the spot near
the Ramaqueban River where the Bushmen, whose remains Frank Oates had
already made more than one fruitless endeavour to obtain, had been
massacred the year before. Still anxious, if possible, to secure some
of them, and finding he was now within easy access of the spot, he
entered into an arrangement with Jacobs to conduct him there; but
again, as on former occasions, when the time arrived for setting off,
his guide was not forthcoming. Jacobs, however, before leaving, had
fortunately on this occasion found a substitute in the person of Van
Roozen, through whose guidance the traveller was at last successful in
his search, as thus related in his Journal:--
“_November 15th._--Cloudy day. Old Piet left, having deputed Van
Roozen to take me to the bones, but wanting to go shares in the profit.
He left a boy with a sack; but Van Roozen seemed so lukewarm, I let
him send away the boy, and was nearly letting him go too, but Dorehill
joined us, and at last we made a plan, persuading Van Roozen to take
us to the place, whilst the waggons trekked to the big branch of the
Tati, where Stoffel was to outspan. Van Roozen seemed a bit nervous;
and, indeed, was rather perplexed to find the place, which, however,
at last he did. It was a pretty spot. Some large trees, laden with
yellow blossoms, growing in rich masses like laburnums, but in spikes,
scented the air. Behind these rose a pretty rugged kopje, and in front
of them were the old huts of the unfortunate Bushmen, and the screens
from the sun which they erect. Heaps of ashes and game bones, broken
pots, and other remains lay around, amongst which the skulls of the
Bushmen appeared conspicuously. We found three here, and three more lay
in the grass at some little distance. We offsaddled and collected some
bones, which I tied up, in order to carry on my saddle in front of me,
and we again set off, but the sky was clouded over, and we were not
sure of our road. However, we came out all right in the waggon-road.
Van Roozen deposited his charge, and we rode forward to the waggons.
Van Roozen shot a quagga just before we crossed the big spruit, and
we soon arrived at the big branch of the Tati, where the waggons were
outspanned, Van Roozen having decided to pass the night there with
us.”[56]
The following morning, early, Van Roozen took his departure, trekking
south, whilst the rest of the party crossed over to the Tati, where,
outspanning at the “poort” (the pretty spot already noticed in the
preceding chapter), they again stopped for two or three days to hunt,
at which point the Journal thus continues:--
“_November 17th._--Heavy shower early; pleasant cloudy day. Out
with two boys, shooting.... During the ride I saw a big game-drive,
made by the Makalakas, consisting of a long broad alley, the sides
composed of large tree branches, forming a strong hedge. At the end
were three pits side by side, walled round with stakes. On the top were
placed light stakes, and long grass was laid over all. My boys say the
Makalakas kill lots of quagga and other game in these traps.
“_November 18th._--Cloudy morning; hot afternoon. Out to the
right, amongst the kopjes; game very scarce.... Rested, whilst out,
under a large tree, with leaves something the shape and appearance of
a poplar; the trunk smooth, thick, and of crooked growth. The fruit of
this tree is small and green, and, when fresh dropped, useless; but the
ground was strewn with last year’s fruit, which contains, under a very
hard shell, some kernel, not unlike walnut, but softer, and very nice,
the only difficulty being the getting at it. Two goats of mine, which I
had bought of Piet Jacobs, and had since been lost, turned up to-day,
having been absent since Sunday afternoon (the 15th). They had come on
alone, one having given birth to two kids.”
The travellers on the 20th again moved slowly forward, and reached the
first kraal of the Makalakas (Wankee’s) on the 22d, where they laid in
a fresh supply of corn, the natives this time making but a very feeble
show of attempting to stop their progress. The day before this Stoffel
had fallen in with a large pack of wild dogs, a circumstance thus
narrated in Frank Oates’s Journal:--
“_November 21st._--Cloudy morning, after a cold night; cool day....
Stoffel rode when we trekked, and shot a quagga. He describes a pack
of wild dogs he saw. Two pallah rushed past him pursued by dogs, which
stopped when they saw him, and began to bark. They were all black,
spotted with white, with thick bushy tails, and dog-like but upright
ears. They were the size of his dog ‘Bob,’ larger than a pointer
considerably--_i.e._ the males; the females, he says, were less. They
kept running and then stopping at near range, but he did not get any.
He says he has seen a pack once beyond the King’s, and once one at
Gasuma, near the Zambesi, like these. A pack he once saw in the Free
State were of a different colour (reddish or gray). That he saw to-day
contained about fifty.”
Leaving the kraal again upon the 24th, the Journal once more
continues:--
“_November 24th._--Hot, with a breeze. Started at 9.30 A.M., and
trekked till noon. Passed the kraal just beyond which my waggon broke
before at a small spruit. We ride through mopani veldt, and soon come
to another kraal. Pass lots of cultivated land, and then more kraals.
The latter are small, and generally placed under a kopje, on which
often grows one of the few striking and picturesque trees of the
country. We crossed two other spruits during the trek, larger than the
first mentioned, but not large.
“A rabbit got up close to the waggon directly after we outspanned, and
the dogs set off. Dorehill lost one of his, and I lost ‘Rock.’ Our
boys found the spoor, and as it turned out the dogs had been stolen by
Makalakas. Stoffel, Dorehill, and I, with Jacob, rode with our guns
and a lot of boys to two or three kraals, threatening them all with
punishment, unless the dogs were given up. At night they were brought
back by one of Stoffel’s and one of Dorehill’s boys, who had been to a
kraal and demanded them. We decided to inspan and ride with the moon.
Trekked through trees, thickly placed (mopani mostly), crossed several
spruits, and outspanned at the Matengwe River; say three hours.
“_November 25th._--Cloudy; heavy rain at night. Here we met a party
of Griquas, who have been in Stoffel’s employ before as hunters, and
they are now willing to turn back their waggon and return with him.
They tell sad tales of the Zambesi fever, of which many of them have
died. They say it is comparatively healthy at Tamasancha, and they
are willing to stand there till April or May, and then go on to the
Zambesi. The old man tells me that a man gets a pain in his head and
lies down, and next morning, if he is alive, he is ‘salted.’ Stoffel
busy making arrangements with these people. Trekked through beautiful
green veldt, road winding amongst a great number of kopjes; mopani,
and other trees. Several large and rather bad spruits crossed. We kept
coming near the Matengwe during this trek, and part of the time the
road keeps along its bank. It is an extremely pretty river, and has
a fine running stream in its sandy bed. I saw a plant quite new to
me, with fine fan-shaped drooping leaves. Some pretty white lilies,
delicately striped with lilac, grew close to the river’s bank. I
enjoyed the scene very much. Few kraals. Where we outspanned, I had a
bathe in the river. People came to sell things.
“_November 26th._--Cloudy day, but hot; shower at night. Went
through mopani veldt, till we came to a big tree, where we stopped.
My mare, who I noticed refused her corn, lay down, and on looking at
her we found her panting, and that there was a running at her nose.
When made to get up, she soon lay down again. Stoffel says it is
horse-sickness. I ordered her to be driven slowly on behind us when we
trekked. Went past Menon’s kraal. Menon and some of his people came
out. He was very civil, and appointed to come to us ahead, which he
did, when we each gave him a present.
“_November 27th._--Cloudy, threatening morning; a few drops of
rain. Rain, thunder, and lightning in the evening. Started before
daylight, and made a short trek through very heavy mopani to the drift
of the Matengwe, where we outspanned. Some yellow matter was running
from the mare’s mouth and nose, but small in quantity. She pants and
coughs, but still eats a little. Stoffel, Dorehill, and Jacob rode
to shoot, and Jacob shot a giraffe. I went on again a short distance
with the waggons, through heavy mopani veldt, finally stopping on a
‘sandbelt’[57] near a pan of water. Went out on foot in the evening,
and saw some pallah, steinbok, and quagga, but they were too wild for
me to get a shot.
“_November 28th._--Cloudy morning. Heavy shower came on immediately
after my return from an unsuccessful hunt on ‘Bob.’... Busy buying
corn. The water lay deep all round my waggon. The mare lying down,
every now and then getting up, but breathing very heavily, and, when
last I saw her, making a ‘roaring’ sound. Nothing was running from her
nose, but I found inside it a little bright yellow and black matter. I
don’t know that she ate anything to-day. She lay most of the time with
her nose on the dirty ground. The skin of her back is all peeling off.
“_November 29th._--Slightly cloudy day; very pleasant. Mare dead; froth
like white sea foam on her nostrils, and inside clear yellow liquid, a
lot of which had run out. She was not perfectly cold when I saw her.
All of them say it is horse-sickness. Dorehill afterwards opened her,
and one of his boys found a great number of large fat grubs in her
stomach, holding on to the inside. They seemed to have eaten the lining
away, and indeed in places to have eaten through the walls of the
stomach itself. This might account for the state of her back, and the
fact of her slavering when she ate her corn, but I don’t think they can
have been the proximate cause of death.... Out shooting to-day, but the
game here is very wild.
“_November 30th._--Cloudy morning; close, hot afternoon.... On
returning from the veldt in the evening, found every one who had been
left at the waggons nearly drunk; the Griquas rushing about with loaded
guns and fighting. Inspanned, to restore order, and went about four
miles.”
The following morning, some five miles further again brought the party
to the Matengwe River, where a halt was made. At this point two English
hunters, whom Frank Oates had met before during his wanderings--Messrs.
Wood and Selous--came up on their way to Tati from the Zambesi. It was
the result of this meeting which apparently determined Frank Oates’s
future plans; for, almost from the first day he left the Tati, the
idea seems to have been present to his mind that he might yet make the
Zambesi the present season, without waiting for the cessation of the
rains. His own inclination was strongly in favour of this attempt, as
saving him from the dilemma, otherwise presented, of either leaving
the country with the river unvisited, or remaining there another
season for the purpose; and the opinion and experience of the two
hunters mentioned above, coincided, as it happened, with his own wish
and inclination. They both believed, and perhaps rightly, that the
present was a safer time for the Zambesi than the month of April,
when the rains would only just be over and the moisture not all dried
up. Indeed Stoffel, who adhered to his present plan and waited to go
on till April, himself took the fever when he reached the river, and
died from its effects. The fact is that neither one plan nor the other
was a good one, and between the two it was but a choice of evils. So
anxious, however, was Frank Oates to reach the river that season,
that, gladly catching at the moderate degree of encouragement he now
chanced to receive from these two gentlemen, he resolved forthwith
to push forward there at once, without intending, however, to make a
lengthened stay, or do more on this occasion than merely see the Falls,
and obtain a few specimens of natural history. And thus resolved, he
again resumed his journey on December 3d, and with no serious delay or
hindrance succeeded in reaching the Zambesi. Before starting, however,
he wrote home the following short letter, which Messrs. Wood and Selous
undertook to convey as far as Tati:--
“MATENGWE RIVER, _December 2d, 1874_.
“Again I report progress. I am past the obnoxious Makalakas, and am
actually going to start for a hurried run to the Victoria Falls. I left
Tati with the people I told you of, who were going on to a place about
three days ahead of here on the Zambesi road, intending to wait there
till April and then go on to the Zambesi. I intended to accompany them
and turn back, as I did not wish to wait for another season, and did
not think it advisable to make a hurried run to the Zambesi and back
again now. Indeed, you would infer from my letters that it was not my
intention to do so. However, things have so turned out that I think I
am choosing the best course in going on now.
“In the first place, I have here met waggons coming from the Zambesi,
those of Wood and Selous, two Englishmen, who hunt and know the country
well. They both advise me to go on at once. They say they would rather
go on now than stand all the time, and then go on in April. In fact
it seems that April is too early; and all agree that it is infinitely
better to go now that the rains are falling than it is to go too soon
after they have ceased to fall. They say the risk of fever is not so
great as long as the rains fall, and the really bad time is when they
have ceased to fall. The traders, however, must wait, in order to avoid
the really bad time, as they could not go there and trade and come back
again; whereas in my case I have only to spend a fortnight in getting
to the standing-place where the waggons are left, and say ten days or a
fortnight in going from there to the Falls and back (it _can_ be
walked in three days, I am told, easily), whilst another fortnight will
bring me back in the waggons. So you may say six weeks will do it all,
and it would not only be possible to be back in Tati before the end of
January, but this would allow a lot of extra time. It is only three
weeks from Tati to Daka, the standing-place, and I am now a week’s
journey on the way.
“A man who knows the Falls and this road well has undertaken to conduct
me to the Falls and back.[58] He is a coloured individual certainly,
but appears a very intelligent and capable fellow. He has been hunting
for Wood and Selous, and it is thought he will prove very efficient.
He has insisted on large relays of medicine and food, and I have been
able to get nearly everything I wanted here. There were in fact eight
waggons in all here yesterday. The trader, who lost his finger when
coming on with me before, with his two waggons, and a partner of his
with one waggon, went on last night. Another trader is turning back now
with Wood and Selous, who are going back; and another waggon, belonging
to a party of Griquas, has gone on with the traders.
“I expect to be back in Bamangwato in February, _en route_
for home.... I can scarcely fancy myself returning so soon from a
successful visit to the Falls, having so often failed; but I think you
will agree with me that I was not wrong in determining to make another
attempt, as things turned out, and acting, as I am, on what I consider
to be very competent advice. It is now the beginning of the rainy
season, but very little rain has yet fallen; only a few heavy showers,
with intervals of very hot weather between them.”
The day after writing this letter--on the 3d of December--Frank Oates
started off again, as above mentioned, towards the Zambesi, and soon
came up with Stoffel, who had left upon the 1st, in company with
another trader who had joined him on the Matengwe. Dorehill had
turned back with Wood and Selous. From this point to Tamasancha, a
watering-place on the road to the Zambesi, where Stoffel and his
companion intended standing till April, the road lay chiefly through
heavy sand, and was traversed in about a week. Soon after starting, the
Matengwe River, which had now been kept near for some time, was left
flowing towards the westward, and shortly afterwards the Nata River was
crossed. From here to the Daka, a small river not far from the Zambesi,
water can only be obtained along the road at the various “pans,” or
small ponds, which occur at intervals throughout this portion of the
country, no other rivers intervening.
At Tamasancha, which was reached on December 10th, Frank Oates, after
a short rest, parted from his companions, proceeding forward on the
14th alone towards the Zambesi. The country, from this point, is only
varied from sand and thick bush by the occasional occurrence of these
“pans” or “vleis,” the favourite haunts of wading-birds and wildfowl.
Soon after leaving Tamasancha one was passed (Flamakinyani) closely
encircled by large trees, and a little later was another (Geruah),
about the size of a duck-pond and extremely pretty, surrounded with the
greenest of grass, whilst all around it extended the barren and sandy
veldt. About here giraffe and other game was met with, including sable
antelope, eland, and wild pig. Fresh elephant spoor was seen north of
Tamasetsie, but the time now allowed of no delays for hunting. The
“poison-plant,” growing low, and bearing a yellow plum-like fruit, was
gathered on one occasion near the waggon-track.
[Illustration: AFRICAN DWARF GOOSE.--_Nettapus auritus._
(Length about 11 inches.)]
The Daka River was reached upon the 21st, and the day after, some miles
further on, two other small streams were reached and crossed, and then
a third into which apparently the first two flowed. This last was a
small river called the Pantamatenka, just beyond which is the place
where waggons stand for travellers going to the Zambesi. These streams,
it was evident, must all be very small, except during the rains. They
were small indeed even now, though overflowing their banks and running
quickly. Almost immediately after crossing the last-named, Frank
Oates’s waggon stuck in a very soft muddy place, but Mr. Blockley, who
was in charge of the trading-station here, came with a span of oxen
to help him out, and the following morning his waggon was taken up to
where the store was built, on a little stony kopje above the watery
flats. Mr. Blockley was here in the capacity of agent for another
trader, then absent--Mr. Westbeach--and with him was a Dr. Bradshaw,
who had been some time in the country. On the succeeding day, December
24th, the waggons of two other traders, Messrs. Trescott and Wilmore,
arrived from the Zambesi, the former of whom had lately been ill with
fever, and was still very deaf and weak, and scarcely able to eat
anything. He described their recent sufferings from fatigue, hunger,
sickness, and the impossibility of keeping dry, as something truly
wretched.
Christmas Day was celebrated at the store by the cooking and eating
of a large plum-pudding worthy of the occasion, and the day following
Frank Oates busied himself with preparing for his walk to the Falls.
This he intended to accomplish in company with Dr. Bradshaw, who had
been there before, and volunteered to go with him. The 27th was the day
fixed for the start, and before leaving he wrote home in high spirits
the following letter to his mother, which Messrs. Trescott and Wilmore
were to take with them when they returned to Tati. It was the last he
wrote:--
“PANTAMATENKA, _December 27th, 1874_.
“I am just about to set off, to walk to the Victoria Falls, which are
only three days from here. This place is somewhere about fifteen miles
to the north-westward of Daka, a place you will probably see in any
recent map. Neither place is a town of any sort, but each is merely a
river flowing to the Zambesi. At both rivers waggons stand, as they are
both out of ‘the fly.’ The place where I now am is quite civilized, as
it is a trading-station, and the man in charge here has a snug little
house, well thatched, to keep out the rain. He has lived here three
years, and is in the employ of Westbeach, who is at present at the
residence of Sepopo, the Zambesi chief, some distance up the river. His
man, Blockley, undertakes the charge of my effects whilst I proceed to
the Falls.
“You will be delighted to hear that there is a _doctor_ here,
who is going to accompany me in my walk, and is a great stickler
for comforts. He was, I think, doctor on a steamer, and at last got
to the Diamond Fields, and thence came here with Westbeach, and has
been here now two years. He spends a good portion of his time in
collecting beetles, and is apparently very good-natured. He never
loses an opportunity of telling you that a thing is very unwholesome,
the next thing being its rapid disappearance into his own interior.
There was a grand plum-pudding made here on Christmas Day. Besides
Blockley and the doctor there are two traders, who arrived here after
I did, on their way from the Zambesi. One has been ill and the doctor
prohibited him plum-pudding, so there were four of us in all. We ate
nothing but pudding on Christmas Day and the day following, with
scarcely an exception. The men had another pudding. My man turns out
to have been originally a cook, and when he likes can cook well. The
doctor was found to be five pounds heavier after dinner than before it
on Christmas Day. He strongly urged upon all of us the desirability
of moderation, but no one seemed to pay much attention to him, and he
certainly did not practise what he preached. He has been to the Falls
before, and in the rainy season too, so he knows what he is undertaking
in going with me. I expect he will make very slow marches, but so much
the better. I am going to take with me the identical tent I had with
me in America, and which proved so effectual a shelter from the snows
of the Rocky Mountains. There was a grand idea in the doctor’s mind of
taking a lot of cold plum-pudding with us on our walk, but the last
morsel disappeared last night. However, we shall not be badly off for
supplies.
“From Tamasancha, where I last wrote to you,[59] and where the
traders were waiting till April, I was nine days in getting here. The
waggon-road all the way goes through thick bush and heavy sand. There
are no rivers, but abundance of pools in the rainy season. We have
not had very much rain, but of course enough to fill the pools, and
enough to make the road, where it goes through turf, as it does before
reaching this place, extremely heavy. My waggon stuck the night of
my arrival, but Blockley brought his oxen and helped me out; which,
however, he failed to accomplish that night, though succeeding the
morning following. He then brought my waggon up here on to the top of a
little hill where his house is, close to which it is now drawn up.
“This must be a comparatively healthy spot, even in the most unhealthy
time, as it overlooks the flat wet country around it, and the water
will run from it. There appeared to me to be much more watery land, and
more pools of water, about Daka than here. It is where so much land
lies under water that, about the end of the rainy season, the fever
is so bad. People may get it almost any time, but February, March,
and April seem to be the worst months. I think Baines is said to have
stated that he would rather be on the Zambesi in January, the height of
the rainy season, than in May, a lovely month, but when the moisture is
perhaps not all dried up. When it is dried up, it is then all right.
Another thing seems to be, that people moving about are better off than
those who have to remain stationary in one place.
“One of my goats was reported to have been killed by a leopard on
Christmas Eve. We all went with our guns, and I took my dogs. We
found the unfortunate goat lying dead, a live companion standing over
it; and, also standing over it, and facing the live goat, an animal
I thought was a dog. They told me it was the leopard, but I would
not fire, still thinking it a dog. At last, however, I saw what it
was, and we shot it. Two others ran away, and my dogs killed both of
them gallantly, and in next to no time. They were cheetahs, a sort of
leopard, very lanky, and a good deal like greyhounds in appearance.
They were very thin, and probably very hungry when they killed the
goat; but the other goat must have kept them from eating it, as it had
been killed a considerable time when we got to it.
“I must now get up and make ready to start. I am writing in the tent,
having had a cup of coffee as usual, but not got up yet. I intended
to have written this letter last night, and, having failed to do so,
thought it best to make sure of its being written before I began
anything else.
“I hope you are all spending a pleasant Christmas and New Year’s time
at home, or wherever you are; and wish every one a very happy New Year.”
Starting upon their journey late that evening, the Journal resumes the
narrative:--
“_December 27th._--Fine hot day, with a north-easterly breeze.
Wrote letter home early, and made final preparations for the walk.
As my own boys had all requested to accompany me, wishing to see
‘Metse-a-tunya,’ I took all (eight in number) except the Bushman, whom,
with two Makalakas engaged for me at Pantamatenka by the doctor, I
left with Klaas. The doctor had also got me another Makalaka, whom he
handed over to me, as well as allowing me to pack one of his own three
boys; so I had the benefit of ten, the doctor had two, and John had
three boys. We were a party, in all, of two white men, one colonial
boy (John Mackenna), and fifteen Kafirs, and left the Pantamatenka a
little before sundown; walked three miles up the river, and, crossing
it, encamped for the night. During the walk I saw a fine tall palm--the
first tall one I have seen. The leaves were fan-like and the tree
extremely graceful.
“_December 28th._--Beautiful day. Had coffee, and started soon
after sunrise. Kept up the river, say five miles, then recrossed and
left it, and went ten miles more, crossing a ‘sandbelt,’ I with two
boys finding water in an open grassy space, or ‘lichter.’ The others
missed the water, and I rejoined them in the long sandbelt, which
extended beyond where we halted. Then went three miles more, passing
some water, of which we were very glad, and at last reached a fine
lichter, with a stream in it, running away to the east, into the
Pantamatenka. On our left was a ridge, some two or three miles off,
with palm on it, which the doctor says he passed on his right, when
he went to the Falls last. Rose to opposite side of lichter, to high
ground, and camped.
“_December 29th._--Fine morning, but rather cloudy; a few drops of
rain in the afternoon. Had coffee, and again started early. Immediately
after starting crossed another stream, also running, they say, into the
Pantamatenka. Giraffe and quagga spoor seen. We only went six miles
to-day, as one of the boys had to be sent back for an axe, and we
waited for him. Maclinwon, who had gone on alone, presently returned,
having shot two rhinoceros, and we all went to the place and camped
there.
“_December 30th._--Cloudy; a shower in the afternoon. Walked ten
miles to-day, crossing at least two sandbelts, the last of which was
stony, and with a very thin stratum of soil on it; the trees few and
sparsely scattered. Some dry stony spruits here, and a fine view of the
opposite sandbelt. Slept at a spruit in the hollow beneath us, where
we had stopped to make tea in the afternoon, but where it looked so
threatening we had pitched the tent. However, the rain was trifling.
Some of Tibakai’s Bushmen were seen and talked to. Whilst the boys
were making the huts, they pointed out the cloud on the horizon to the
northward from Metse-a-tunya. It keeps rising in a white puff, and
passing away in little fleecy clouds. The others heard the Falls; I am
not sure I did.
“_December 31st._--Rather cloudy; heavy rain about sundown. Fine
night. Went, roughly, say three miles further north across turf, to
the river where I thought Tibakai was encamped, but found we were
too much to the left, so after crossing the river kept down it about
three-quarters of a mile to his camp. John was in front, hurrying on
with one of his boys, but when he came near the huts, stopped and hid
behind a bush, from which he was peering when we joined him. Here he
wanted to stay and send for Tibakai to talk, our object being to get
two Bushmen from him to go with us to the Zambesi, for corn. I ordered
him and the boys to march on to the huts, and not stop at a distance
now that they knew we were there. John was in a great funk, but found,
with Tibakai, a hunter whom he knew. I left the boys and traps under
a tree amongst the huts, and went with the doctor and John to have an
interview with Tibakai. He is a Mungwato headman, with one or two of
his own people, but all the rest are Bushmen, hunting for him, and
staying with him with their families. Tibakai said we could not go
to the Falls--he was captain here. Hearing, however, we did not come
to hunt, he said we might go but must make our scherm here, and stay
till to-morrow, when we might visit the Falls and return. He then
conceded that we might have two Bushmen, whom he would give us to-night
when they returned from hunting, but said we _must_ sleep here
to-night. I said we must go, and he could do as he pleased about the
Bushmen. After this he again said we must stay to-night. This I flatly
refused to do, and had already told him we should shoot elephants if we
saw them. John wanted me to stay, and refused to come away. I ordered
the boys to start, they having already told me they were willing, and
again for the third time called John. We then started, all but him,
and there was a great stir in the place; caps snapping, and one fellow
running out with his gun. We moved on, I on the flank ready to fire;
but it was not necessary. John remained behind, but, seeing us get
away, joined us, and, when I upbraided him, said he was only waiting to
see what they would do.”
And now a walk of some twelve or fifteen miles brought them to the
goal. The latter part--five miles or so--of this was over rolling
ground, and here, as they advanced, they soon began to see more
clearly the distant clouds of vapour from the Falls, and hear them more
distinctly. The trees, before thinly scattered, were now fine and close
together, and for a time obscured the view. Then shortly, through an
opening in their midst, the columns of spray again were visible, now
quite near, and the party pressed quickly on. The sun was about to set,
and clouds were gathering, as if for an approaching storm. Stopping to
shelter from a heavy shower just above the river, the first sight of
Metse-a-tunya was here caught through the trees, and a halt was ordered
for the night.
[Illustration: WOODEN PILLOW.]
Thus, the last day of 1874, the sun set on the fulfilment--after many
hindrances--of the traveller’s great desire!