He was more successful at Mabotsa, also inhabited by the Bakwains, to which place he removed in 1843. It was here, while in chase of a lion, that he nearly lost his life. He had fired both the barrels of his gun, and was re-loading, when the lion, though desperately wounded, sprang upon him, catching his shoulder, both man and beast coming to the ground together. Growling horribly, the fierce brute shook the doctor 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 a cat. The gun of his companion, a native schoolmaster, who came to his assistance, missed fire, when the lion, leaving Dr Livingstone, attacked him. Another native came up with a spear, when the lion flew at him also, but the bullets at that moment taking effect, the fierce brute fell down dead. The chief of the Bakwains, Sechele, became a Christian, and exerted himself for the conversion of his people, restoring his wives to their fathers, and living in every respect a thoroughly consistent life. The Dutch Boers, who had pushed forward to the confines of the country, proved, however, most adverse to the success of the mission, by carrying off the natives and compelling them to labour as slaves. By the advice of Dr Laidley, Sechele and his people moved to Kolobeng, a stream about two hundred miles to the north of Kuruman, where Dr Livingstone formed a station. He here built a house with his own hands, having learned carpentering and gardening from Mr Moffat, as also blacksmith work. He had now become handy at almost any trade, in addition to doctoring and preaching, and, as his wife could make candles, soap, and clothes, they possessed what may be considered the indispensable accomplishments of a missionary family in Central Africa. Among the gentlemen who had visited the station was Mr Oswell, in the East India Company's service. He deserves to take rank as an African traveller. Hearing that Dr Livingstone purposed crossing the Kalahara Desert in search of the great Lake Ngami, long known to exist, he came from India on purpose to join him, accompanied by Mr Murray, volunteering to pay the entire expenses of the guides. The Kalahara, though called a desert from being composed of soft sand and being destitute of water, supports prodigious herds of antelopes, while numbers of elephants, rhinoceros, lions, hyenas, and other animals roam over it. They find support from the astonishing quantity of grass which grows in the region, as also from a species of water-melon, and from several tuberous roots, the most curious of which is the _leroshua_, as large as the head of a young child, and filled with a fluid like that of a turnip. Another, the _mokuri_, an herbaceous creeper, the tubers of which, as large as a man's head, it deposits in a circle of a yard or more horizontally from the stem. On the water-melons especially, the elephants and other wild animals revel luxuriously.