Chapter 23

The general instructions I received from the directors of the London Missionary Society led me, as soon as I reached Kuruman or Lattakoo, then their farthest inland station from the Cape, to turn my attention to the north. Without waiting longer at Kuruman than was necessary to recruit the oxen, which were pretty well tired by the long journey from Algoa Bay, I proceeded, in company with another missionary, to the Bechuana or Bakwain country, and found Sechele, with his tribe, located at Shokuane. We shortly afterward retraced our steps to Kuruman; but as the objects in view were by no means to be attained by a temporary excursion of this sort, I determined to make a fresh start into the interior as soon as possible. Accordingly, after resting three months at Kuruman, which is a kind of head station in the country, I returned to a spot about fifteen miles south of Shokuane, called Lepelole (now Litubaruba). Here, in order to obtain an accurate knowledge of the language, I cut myself off from all European society for about six months, and gained by this ordeal an insight into the habits, ways of thinking, laws, and language of that section of the Bechuanas called Bakwains, which has proved of incalculable advantage in my intercourse with them ever since.

In this second journey to Lepelole--so called from a cavern of that name--I began preparations for a settlement by making a canal to irrigate gardens from a stream, then flowing copiously, but now quite dry. When these preparations were well advanced I went northward to visit the Bakaa and Bamangwato, and the Makalaka, living between 22° and 23° south latitude. The Bakaa Mountains had been visited before by a trader, who, with his people, all perished from fever. In going round the northern part of these basaltic hills, near Letloche, I was only ten days distant from the lower part of the Zouga, which passed by the same name as Lake Ngami; and I might then (in 1842) have discovered that lake, had discovery alone been my object. Most of this journey beyond Shokuane was performed on foot, in consequence of the draught oxen having become sick. Some of my companions who had recently joined us, and did not know that I understood a little of their speech, were overheard by me discussing my appearance and powers: "He is not strong; he is quite slim, and only appears stout because he puts himself into those bags [trousers]; he will soon knock up." This caused my Highland blood to rise, and made me despise the fatigue of keeping them all at the top of their speed for days together, till I heard them expressing proper opinions of my pedestrian powers.

Returning to Kuruman, in order to bring my luggage to our proposed settlement, I was followed by the news that the tribe of Bakwains, who had shown themselves so friendly toward me, had been driven from Lepelole by the Barolongs, so that my prospects for the time of forming a settlement there were at an end. One of those periodical outbreaks of war, which seem to have occurred from time immemorial, for the possession of cattle, had burst forth in the land, and had so changed the relations of the tribes to each other that I was obliged to set out anew to look for a suitable locality for a mission-station.

In going north again a comet blazed on our sight, exciting the wonder of every tribe we visited. That of 1816 had been followed by an irruption of the Matabele, the most cruel enemies the Bechuanas ever knew, and this they thought might portend something as bad, or it might only foreshadow the death of some great chief. On this subject of comets I knew little more than they did themselves, but I had that confidence in a kind overruling Providence which makes such a difference between Christians and both the ancient and modern heathen.

As some of the Bamangwato people had accompanied me to Kuruman, I was obliged to restore them and their goods to their chief Sekomi. This made a journey to the residence of that chief again necessary, and, for the first time, I performed a distance of some hundred miles on oxback.

Returning toward Kuruman, I selected the beautiful valley of Mabotsa (latitude 25° 14' south, longitude 26° 30') as the site of a missionary-station, and thither I removed in 1843. Here an occurrence took place concerning which I have frequently been questioned in England, and which, but for the importunities of friends, I meant to have kept in store to tell my children when in my dotage. The Bakatla of the village Mabotsa were much troubled by lions, which leaped into the cattle-pens by night and destroyed their cows. They even attacked the herds in open day. This was so unusual an occurrence that the people believed they were bewitched--"given," as they said, "into the power of the lions by a neighboring tribe." They went at once to attack the animals, but, being rather a cowardly people compared to Bechuanas in general on such occasions, they returned without killing any.

It is well known that if one of a troop of lions is killed, the others take the hint and leave that part of the country. So the next time the herds were attacked I went with the people in order to encourage them to rid themselves of the annoyance by destroying one of the marauders. We found the lions on a small hill about a quarter of a mile in length and covered with trees. A circle of men was formed round it, and they gradually closed up, ascending pretty near to each other. Being down below on the plain with a native schoolmaster, named Mebalwe, a most excellent man, I saw one of the lions sitting on a piece of rock within the now closed circle of men. Mebalwe fired at him before I could, and the ball struck the rock on which the animal was sitting. He bit at the spot struck, as a dog does at a stick or stone thrown at him; then leaping away, broke through the opening circle and escaped unhurt. The men were afraid to attack him, perhaps on account of their belief in witchcraft.

When the circle was re-formed we saw two other lions in it; but we were afraid to fire lest we should strike the men, and they allowed the beasts to burst through also. If the Bakatla had acted according to the custom of the country, they would have speared the lions in their attempt to get out. Seeing we could not get them to kill one of the lions, we bent our footsteps toward the village; in going round the end of the hill, however, I saw one of the beasts sitting on a piece of rock as before, but this time he had a little bush in front. Being about thirty yards off, I took a good aim at his body through the bush, and fired both barrels into it. The men then called out, "He is shot! He is shot!"

Others cried: "He has been shot by another man too; let us go to him!" I did not see anyone else shoot at him, but I saw the lion's tail erected in anger behind the bush, and, turning to the people said, "Stop a little, till I load again." When in the act of ramming down the bullets I heard a shout. Starting, and looking half round, I saw the lion just in the act of springing upon me. I was upon a little height; he caught my shoulder as he sprang, and we both came to the ground below together. Growling horribly close to my ear, he shook me as a terrier dog does a rat. The shock produced a stupor similar to that which seems to be felt by a mouse after the first shake of the cat. It caused a sort of dreaminess, in which there was no sense of pain nor feeling of terror, though quite conscious of all that was happening. It was like what patients partially under the influence of chloroform describe, who see all the operation, but feel not the knife.

This singular condition was not the result of any mental process. The shake annihilated fear, and allowed no sense of horror in looking round at the beast. This peculiar state is probably produced in all animals killed by the carnivora; and if so, is a merciful provision by our benevolent Creator for lessening the pain of death. Turning round to relieve myself of the weight, as he had one paw on the back of my head, I saw his eyes directed to Mabalwe, who was trying to shoot him at a distance of ten or fifteen yards. His gun, a flint one, missed fire in both barrels; the lion immediately left me, and, attacking Mebalwe, bit his thigh. Another man--whose life I had saved before, after he had been tossed by a buffalo--attempted to spear the lion while he was biting Mebalwe. He left Mebalwe and caught this man by the shoulder, but at that moment the bullets he had received took effect, and he fell down dead. The whole was the work of a few moments, and must have been his paroxysms of dying rage. In order to take out the charm from him, the Bakatla on the following day made a huge bonfire over the carcass, which was declared to be that of the largest lion they had ever seen. Besides crunching the bone into splinters, he left eleven teeth wounds on the upper part of my arm. It was a long time in healing.

The exact position of Lake Ngami had, for half a century at least, been correctly pointed out by the natives, who had visited it when rains were more copious in the desert than in more recent times, and many attempts had been made to reach it by passing through the desert in the direction indicated; but it was found impossible, even for Griquas, who, having some Bushman blood in them, may be supposed more capable of enduring thirst than Europeans. It was clear, then, that our only chance of success was by going round, instead of through, the desert.

On July 4, 1849, we went forward on horseback toward what we supposed to be the lake, and again and again did we seem to see it; but at last we came to the veritable water of the Zouga, and found it to be a river running to the northeast. A village of Bakurutse lay on the opposite bank; these live among Batletli, a tribe having a click in their language, and who were found by Sebituane to possess large herds of the great horned cattle. They seem allied to the Hottentot family. Mr. Oswell, in trying to cross the river, got his horse bogged in the swampy bank. Two Bakwains and I managed to get over by wading beside a fishing-weir. The people were friendly, and informed us that this water came out of the Ngami. This news gladdened all our hearts, for we now felt certain of reaching our goal. We might, they said, be a moon on the way; but we had the River Zouga at our feet, and by following it we should at last reach the broad water.

When we had gone up the bank of this beautiful river about ninety-six miles from the point where we first struck it, and understood that we were still a considerable distance from the Ngami, we left all the oxen and wagons, except Mr. Oswell's, which was the smallest, and one team, at Ngabisane, in the hope that they would be recruited for the home journey, while we made a push for the lake.

Twelve days after our departure from the wagons at Ngabisane we came to the northeast end of Lake Ngami; and on August 1, 1849, we went down together to the broad part, and for the first time this fine-looking sheet of water was beheld by Europeans. The direction of the lake seemed to be north-northeast and south-southwest by compass. The southern portion is said to bend round to the west, and to receive the Teoughe from the north at its northwest extremity. We could detect no horizon where we stood looking south-south west, nor could we form any idea of the extent of the lake, except from the reports of the inhabitants of the district; and, as they professed to go round it in three days, allowing twenty-five miles a day would make it seventy-five, or less than seventy geographical miles in circumference.

Other guesses have been made since as to its circumference, ranging between seventy and one hundred miles. It is shallow, for I subsequently saw a native punting his canoe over seven or eight miles of the northeast end; it can never therefore be of much value as a commercial highway. In fact, during the months preceding the annual supply of water from the north, the lake is so shallow that it is with difficulty cattle can approach the water through the boggy, reedy banks. These are low on all sides, but on the west there is a space devoid of trees, showing that the waters have retired thence at no very ancient date. This is another of the proofs of desiccation met with so abundantly throughout the whole country. A number of dead trees lie on this space, some of them imbedded in the mud right in the water. We were informed by the Bayeiye, who live on the lake, that when the annual inundation begins, not only trees of great size, but antelopes, as the springbuck and _tsessebe_ (_Acronotus lunata_,) are swept down by its rushing waters; the trees are gradually driven by the winds to the opposite side, and become imbedded in mud.

When the lake is full, the water is perfectly fresh, but brackish when low; and that coming down the Tamunak'le we found to be so clear, cold, and soft, the higher we ascended, that the idea of melting snow was suggested to our minds. We found this region, with regard to that from which we had come, to be clearly a hollow, the lowest point being Lake Kumadau; the point of the ebullition of water as shown by one of Newman's barometric thermometers, was only between 207-1/2° and 206°, giving an elevation of not much more than two thousand feet above the level of the sea. We had descended above two thousand feet in coming to it from Kolobeng. It is the southern and lowest part of the great river system beyond, in which large tracts of country are inundated annually by tropical rains. A little of that water, which in the countries farther north produces inundation, comes as far south as 20° 20', the latitude of the upper end of the lake, and instead of flooding the country, falls into the lake as into a reservoir. It begins to flow down the Embarrah, which divides into the Rivers Tzo and Teoughe. The Tzo divides into the Tamunak'le and Mababe; the Tamunak'le discharges itself into the Zouga, and the Teoughe into the lake. The flow begins in either March or April, and the descending waters find the channels of all these rivers dried out, except in certain pools in their beds, which have long dry spaces between them. The lake itself is very low. The Zouga is but a prolongation of the Tamunak'le, and an arm of the lake reaches up to the point where the one ends and the other begins. The last is narrow and shallow, while the Zouga is broad and deep. The narrow arm of the lake, which on the map looks like a continuation of the Zouga, has never been observed to flow either way.

THOMAS HUGHES

Before the middle of 1852 Livingstone was ready to start on the journey which resulted in the opening of routes from Central Africa to the West and East coasts; but the way was still beset with difficulties. The missionary societies were regarded as "unpatriotic" by the authorities at the Cape; and he, as the most outspoken of critics, and the most uncompromising denouncer of the slave-trade and champion of the natives, came in for a double share of their suspicion. On the other hand, his brethren gave him only a half-hearted support and doubted his orthodoxy. He found great difficulty even in procuring ammunition. A country postmaster whom he had accused of overcharging, threatened an action at the last moment, which he compromised rather than be detained. As it was, he had anticipated his meagre salary by more than a year, and had to be content with very inferior oxen, and a wagon which required constant mending throughout the journey. On June 8, 1852, he at last got away, taking with him a Mr. Fleming, the agent of his friend Mr. Rutherford, a Cape merchant, in the hope of by degrees substituting legitimate traffic for that in slaves.

The heavy Cape wagon with its ten poor oxen dragged heavily onward. Livingstone had so loaded himself with parcels for stations up-country, and his wagon and team were so inferior, that he did not reach Kuruman until September. Here he was detained by the breaking of a wheel.

The journey to Linyanti by the new route was very trying. Part of the country was flooded, and they were wading all day, and forcing their way through reeds with sharp edges "with hands all raw and bloody." "On emerging from the swamps," says Livingstone, "when walking before the wagon in the morning twilight, I observed a lioness about fifty yards from me in the squatting way they walk when going to spring. She was followed by a very large lion, but seeing the wagon she turned back."

It required all his tact to prevent guides and servants from deserting. Everyone but himself was attacked by fever. "I would like," says his journal, "to devote a portion of my life to the discovery of a remedy for that terrible disease, the African fever. I would go into the parts where it prevails most and try to discover if the natives have a remedy for it. I must make many inquiries of the river people in this quarter." Again in another key: "Am I on my way to die in Sebituane's country? Have I seen the last of my wife and children, leaving this fair world and knowing so little of it?"

February 4, 1853: "I am spared in health while all the company have been attacked by fever. If God has accepted my service, my life is charmed till my work is done. When that is finished, some simple thing will give me my quietus. Death is a glorious event to one going to Jesus."

Their progress was tedious beyond all precedent. "We dug out several wells, and each time had to wait a day or two till enough water flowed in for our cattle to quench their thirst."

At last, however, at the end of May, he reached the Chobe River and was again among his favorite Makololo. "He has dropped from the clouds," the first of them said. They took the wagon to pieces and carried it across on canoes lashed together, while they themselves swam and dived among the oxen "more like alligators than men." Sekeletu, son of Sebituane, was now chief, his elder sister Mamochishane having resigned in disgust at the number of husbands she had to maintain as chieftainess. Poor Mamochishane! After a short reign of a few months she had risen in the assembly and "addressed her brother with a womanly gush of tears. 'I have been a chief only because my father wished it. I would always have preferred to be married and have a family like other women. You, Sekeletu, must be chief, and build up our father's house.'"

On November 11, 1853, he left Linyanti, and arrived at Loanda on May 31, 1854. The first stages of the journey were to be by water, and Sekeletu accompanied him to the Chobe, where he was to embark. They crossed five branches before reaching the main stream, a wide and deep river full of hippopotami. "The chief lent me his own canoe, and as it was broader than usual I could turn about in it with ease. I had three muskets for my people, and a rifle and double-barrelled shotgun for myself. My ammunition was distributed through the luggage, that we might not be left without a supply. Our chief hopes for food were in our guns. I carried twenty pounds of beads worth forty shillings, a few biscuits, a few pounds of tea and sugar, and about twenty pounds of coffee. One small tin canister, about fifteen inches square, was filled with spare shirts, trousers, and shoes, to be used when we reached civilized life, another of the same size was stored with medicines, a third with books, and a fourth with a magic lantern, which we found of much service. The sextant and other instruments were carried apart. A bag contained the clothes we expected to wear out in the journey, which, with a small tent just sufficient to sleep in, a sheepskin mantle as a blanket, and a horse rug as a bed, completed my equipment. An array of baggage would have probably excited the cupidity of the tribes through whose country we wished to pass."

The voyage up the Chobe, and the Zambesi after the junction of those rivers, was prosperous but slow, in consequence of stoppages opposite villages. "My man Pitsane knew of the generous orders of Sekeletu, and was not disposed to allow them remain a dead letter." In the rapids, "the men leaped into the water without the least hesitation to save the canoes from being dashed against the obstructions or caught in eddies. They must never be allowed to come broadside to the stream, for being flat-bottomed they would at once be capsized and everything in them lost." When free from fever he was delighted to note the numbers of birds, several of them unknown, which swarmed on the river and its banks, all carefully noted in his journal. One extract must suffice here: "Whenever we step on shore a species of plover, a plaguy sort of public-spirited individual, follows, flying overhead, and is most persevering in its attempts to give warning to all animals to flee from the approaching danger."

But he was already weak with fever; was seized with giddiness whenever he looked up quickly, and, if he could not catch hold of some support, fell heavily--a bad omen for his chance of passing through the unknown country ahead--but his purpose never faltered for a moment. On January 1, 1854, he was still on the river, but getting beyond Sekeletu's territory and allies, to a region of dense forest, in the open glades of which dwelt the Balonda, a powerful tribe, whose relations with the Makololo were precarious. Each was inclined to raid on the other since the Mambari and Portuguese half-castes had appeared with Manchester goods. These excited the intense wonder and cupidity of both nations. They listened to the story of cotton-mills as fairy dreams, exclaiming: "How can iron spin, weave, and print? Truly ye are gods!" and were already inclined to steal their neighbors' children--those of their own tribe they never sold at this time--to obtain these wonders out of the sea.

Happily Livingstone had brought back with him several Balonda children who had been carried off by the Makololo. This, and his speeches to Manenko, the chieftainess of the district and niece of Shinte, the head chief of the Balonda, gained them a welcome. This Amazon was a strapping young woman of twenty, who led their party through the forest at a pace which tried the best walkers. She seems to have been the only native whose will ever prevailed against Livingstone's.

He intended to proceed up to her uncle Shinte's town in canoes: she insisted that they should march by land, and ordered her people to shoulder his baggage in spite of him. "My men succumbed, and left me powerless. I was moving off in high dudgeon to the canoes, when she kindly placed her hand on my shoulder, and with a motherly look said, 'Now, my little man, just do as the rest have done.' My feeling of annoyance of course vanished, and I went out to try for some meat. My men, in admiration of her pedestrian powers, kept remarking, 'Manenko is a soldier,' and we were all glad when she proposed a halt for the night."

Shinte received them in his town, the largest and best laid out that Livingstone had seen in Central Africa, on a sort of throne covered with leopard-skin. The _kotla_, or place of audience, was one hundred yards square. Though in the sweating stage of an intermittent fever, Livingstone held his own with the chief, gave him an ox as "his mouth was bitter from want of flesh," advised him to open a trade in cattle with the Makololo, and to put down the slave-trade; and, after spending more than a week with him, left amid the warmest professions of friendship. Shinte found him a guide of his tribe, Intemese by name, who was to stay by them till they reached the sea, and at a last interview hung round his neck a conical shell of such value that two of them, so his men assured him, would purchase a slave.