A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries: And of the Discovery of Lakes Shirwa and Nyassa, 1858-1864Livingstone, David
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A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries: And of the Discovery of Lakes Shirwa and Nyassa, 1858-1864
Livingstone, David
Africa, Central -- Description and travel; Africa, Central -- Discovery and exploration
arboriculturists in the country, rear native fruit-trees alone--the
mosibe, the motsikiri, the boma, and others. When a tribe takes an
interest in trees, it becomes more attached to the spot on which they are
planted, and they prove one of the civilizing influences.
Where one Englishman goes, others are sure to follow. Mr. Baldwin, a
gentleman from Natal, succeeded in reaching the Falls guided by his
pocket-compass alone. On meeting the second subject of Her Majesty, who
had ever beheld the greatest of African wonders, we found him a sort of
prisoner at large. He had called on Mashotlane to ferry him over to the
north side of the river, and, when nearly over, he took a bath, by
jumping in and swimming ashore. "If," said Mashotlane, "he had been
devoured by one of the crocodiles which abound there, the English would
have blamed us for his death. He nearly inflicted a great injury upon
us, therefore, we said, he must pay a fine." As Mr. Baldwin had nothing
with him wherewith to pay, they were taking care of him till he should
receive beads from his wagon, two days distant.
Mashotlane's education had been received in the camp of Sebituane, where
but little regard was paid to human life. He was not yet in his prime,
and his fine open countenance presented to us no indication of the evil
influences which unhappily, from infancy, had been at work on his mind.
The native eye was more penetrating than ours; for the expression of our
men was, "He has drunk the blood of men--you may see it in his eyes." He
made no further difficulty about Mr. Baldwin; but the week after we left
he inflicted a severe wound on the head of one of his wives with his
rhinoceros-horn club. She, being of a good family, left him, and we
subsequently met her and another of his wives proceeding up the country.
The ground is strewn with agates for a number of miles above the Falls;
but the fires, which burn off the grass yearly, have injured most of
those on the surface. Our men were delighted to hear that they do as
well as flints for muskets; and this with the new ideas of the value of
gold (_dalama_) and malachite, that they had acquired at Tette, made them
conceive that we were not altogether silly in picking up and looking at
stones.
Marching up the river, we crossed the Lekone at its confluence, about
eight miles above the island Kalai, and went on to a village opposite the
Island Chundu. Nambowe, the headman, is one of the Matebele or Zulus,
who have had to flee from the anger of Moselekatse, to take refuge with
the Makololo.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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