they have always plenty to bestow as well as receive. We were strangers, and knew that, as Makololo, we had not the best of characters, yet his treatment of us was wonderfully good and liberal.

I complimented him on the possession of cattle, and pleased him by telling him how he might milk the cows. He has a herd of about thirty, really splendid animals, all reared from two which he bought from the Balobale when he was young. They are generally of a white color, and are quite wild, running off with graceful ease like a herd of elands on the approach of a stranger. They excited the unbounded admiration of the Makololo, and clearly proved that the country was well adapted for them. When Katema wishes to slaughter one, he is obliged to shoot it as if it were a buffalo. Matiamvo is said to possess a herd of cattle in a similar state. I never could feel certain as to the reason why they do not all possess cattle in a country containing such splendid pasturage.

As Katema did not offer an ox, as would have been done by a Makololo or Caffre chief, we slaughtered one of our own, and all of us were delighted to get a meal of meat, after subsisting so long on the light porridge and green maize of Londa. On occasions of slaughtering an animal, some pieces of it are in the fire before the skin is all removed from the body. A frying-pan full of these pieces having been got quickly ready, my men crowded about their father, and I handed some all round. It was a strange sight to the Balonda, who were looking on, wondering. I offered portions to them too, but these were declined, though they are excessively fond of a little animal food to eat with their vegetable diet. They would not eat with us, but they would take the meat and cook it in their own way, and then use it. I thought at one time that they had imported something from the Mohammedans, and the more especially as an exclamation of surprise, "Allah," sounds like the Illah of the Arabs; but we found, a little farther on, another form of salutation, of Christian (?) origin, "Ave-rie" (Ave Marie). The salutations probably travel farther than the faith. My people, when satisfied with a meal like that which they enjoy so often at home, amused themselves by an uproarious dance. Katema sent to ask what I had given them to produce so much excite

348

A DIGNIFIED ANCIENT.

ment. Intemese replied it was their custom, and they meant no harm. The companion of the ox we slaughtered refused food for two days, and went lowing about for him continually. He seemed inconsolable for his loss, and tried again and again to escape back to the Makololo country. My men remarked, "He thinks they will kill me as well as my friend." Katema thought it the result of art, and had fears of my skill in medicine, and of course witchcraft. He refused to see the magic

lantern.

One of the affairs which had been intrusted by Shinte to Intemese was the rescue of a wife who had eloped with a young man belonging to Katema. As this was the only case I have met with in the interior in which a fugitive was sent back to a chief against his own will, I am anxious to mention it. On Intemese claiming her as his master's wife, she protested loudly against it, saying "she knew she was not going back to be a wife again; she was going back to be sold to the Mambari.” My men formed many friendships with the people of Katema, and some of the poorer classes said in confidence, “We wish our children could go back with you to the Makololo country; here we are all in danger of being sold." My men were of opinion that it was only the want of knowledge of the southern country which prevented an exodus of all the lower portions of Londa population thither.

living in a flat forest

It is remarkable how little people country like this know of distant tribes. An old man, who said he had been born about the same time as the late Matiamvo, and had been his constant companion through life, visited us; and as I was sitting on some grass in front of the little gipsy tent mending my camp stool, I invited him to take a seat on the grass beside me. This was peremptorily refused: "he had never sat on the ground during the late chief's reign, and he was not going to degrade himself now." One of my men handed him a log of wood taken from the fire, and helped him out of the difficulty. When I offered him some cooked meat on a plate, he would not touch that either, but would take it home. So I humored him by sending a servant to bear a few ounces of meat to the town behind him. He mentioned the Lõlŏ (Lulua) as the branch of the Leeambye which flows southward

or S.S.E.; but the people of Matiamvo had never gone far down it, as their chief had always been afraid of encountering a tribe whom, from the description given, I could recognize as the Makololo. He described five rivers as falling into the Lolo, viz., the Lishish, Líss or Lise, Kaliléme, Ishidísh, and Molóng. None of these are large, but when they are united in the Lolo they form a considerable stream. The country through which the Lolo flows is said to be flat, fertile, well peopled, and there are large patches of forest. In this report he agreed perfectly with the people of Matiamvo, whom we had met at Quendende's village. But we never could get him, or any one in this quarter, to draw a map on the ground, as people may readily be got to do in the south.

Katema promised us the aid of some of his people as carriers, but his rule is not very stringent or efficient, for they refused to turn out for the work. They were Balobale; and he remarked on their disobedience that, though he received them as fugitives, they did not feel grateful enough to obey, and if they continued rebellious he must drive them back whence they came; but there is little fear of that, as all the chiefs are excessively anxious to collect men in great numbers around them. These Balobale would not go, though our guide Shakatwala ran after some of them with a drawn sword. This degree of liberty to rebel was very striking to us, as it occurred in a country where people may be sold, and often are so disposed of when guilty of any crime; and we well knew that open disobedience like this among the Makololo would be punished with death without much ceremony.

On Sunday, the 19th, both I and several of our party were seized with fever, and I could do nothing but toss about in my little tent, with the thermometer above 90°, though this was the beginning of winter, and my men made as much shade as possible by planting branches of trees all round and over it. We have, for the first time in my experience in Africa, had a cold wind from the north. All the winds from that quarter are hot, and those from the south are cold, but they seldom blow from either direction.

20th. We were glad to get away, though not on account of any scarcity of food; for my men, by giving small presents of

meat as an earnest of their sincerity, formed many friendships with the people of Katema. We went about four or five miles in a N.N.W. direction, then two in a westerly one, and came round the small end of Lake Dilolo. It seemed, as far as we could at this time discern, to be like a river a quarter of a mile wide. It is abundantly supplied with fish and hippopotami; the broad part, which we did not this time see, is about three miles wide, and the lake is almost seven or eight long. If it be thought strange that I did not go a few miles to see the broad part, which, according to Katema, had never been visited by any of the traders, it must be remembered that in consequence of fever I had eaten nothing for two entire days, and, instead of sleep, the whole of the nights were employed in incessant drinking of water, and I was now so glad to get on in the journey and see some of my fellow fever-patients crawling along, that I could not brook the delay, which astronomical observations for accurately determining the geographical position of this most interesting spot would have occasioned.

We observed among the people of Katema a love for singingbirds. One pretty little songster, named "cabazo,” a species of canary, is kept in very neatly made cages, having traps on the top to entice its still free companions. On asking why they kept them in confinement, "Because they sing sweetly," was the answer. They feed them on the lotsa (Pennisetum typhoïdeum), of which great quantities are cultivated as food for man, and these canaries plague the gardeners here, very much in the same way as our sparrows do at home.

I was pleased to hear the long-forgotten cry of alarm of the canaries in the woods, and observed one warbling forth its song, and keeping in motion from side to side, as these birds do in the cage. We saw also tame pigeons; and the Barotse, who always take care to exalt Santuru, reminded us that this chief had many doves, and kept canaries which had reddish heads when the birds attained maturity. Those we now see have the real canary color on the breast, with a tinge of green; the back, yellowish green, with darker longitudinal bands meeting in the centre; a narrow dark band passes from the bill over the eye and back to the bill again.

The birds of song here set up quite a merry chorus in the