gradually revealed some of the secrets of the bush. We had long ago learned to make excellent spinach from different foliage plants (called Mlenda); now they showed me many different kinds of excellent wild fruit. We also learnt that the kernel of the Mbinji-fruit, the pulp of which I already knew contains prussic acid, is quite free from acid, and when roasted makes an exceptionally delicate dish, tasting like our hazel-nut. On the 17th December, 1917, Headquarters arrived at Chirumba (Mtarika). Lieutenant von Ruckteschell, with his company, had gone on ahead and had soon driven off the weak Portuguese outposts. This was a station of the Portuguese Nyassa company; this merchant company also administered the northern part of the colony. Further south, too, the administration is in the hands of other private companies. The Portuguese official in Chirumba, called Fernandez, seems to have been very capable. The massive buildings of his station, situated at the top of a bare eminence, were spotlessly clean. A trench ensured it against surprise. Beautiful gardens with fruit and vegetables stretched along the bank of the adjacent Ludjenda river. Avenues of mulberry and mango trees fringed the carefully laid-out roads. Many species of this mango fruit, known to the natives as Emben, were to be found in the station and the neighbouring native villages. It was already beginning to ripen and was so plentiful that it was found worth while to have the fruit systematically gathered. The waste to which the natives are generally prone was prevented as far as possible. The beautiful, sweet fruit was enjoyed by all the Europeans and a great part of the natives, and, in view of the shortage of sugar, for weeks provided a really valuable addition to the supplies. When, on my arrival at Chirumba, I stepped on to the veranda of the European house, Lieutenant Ruckteschell set before me some hog’s lard, which I had not seen for a long time. Here, as at many other Portuguese stations, there had been European pigs.