Of all the natives we had met during our wanderings, those of ’Mtasa’s pleased us least; they appeared to us to be completely wanting in all delicacy of feeling, and had to be driven by force from our tents. They seemed to us to be an ill-bred, impudent race, and though their home was so lovely we left it without regret. Somehow, too, our visit to ’Mtasa’s kraal was altogether unsatisfactory; we left it with the consciousness that there were mysteries in it which we had not yet explored. At the very last moment, just as we were packing up our things, I chanced to see on a rock close by our camp some more of the Bushman drawings, grotesque figures of men with bows and arrows and deer grazing, in the usual colours of red and yellow. I feel confident that in the massive mountain behind the kraal some more fortunate travellers will find objects of interest which will well repay investigation. We have distinctly unpleasant recollections of the place, as we have also of a certain dangerous slippery drift or ford across the River Odzani, which we found about half way between ’Mtasa’s and the B.S.A. camp at Umtali. We had to take off our shoes and stockings and lead our horses across the slippery rocks; they, poor things, slipped at every step and trembled with fright. As for our donkeys, they subsided altogether, and had to be unloaded and almost carried across. CHAPTER XII THE JOURNEY TO THE COAST We reached Umtali on October 24, just a month after leaving Fort Salisbury. We were distinctly weary and wayworn, and having had but little food of late we partook of the refreshments kindly set before us by the officers of the Chartered Company with, to us, unparalleled heartiness. At Umtali we pitched our tents near a stream with every intention, as time would permit, of taking a few days of rest and retrospect before starting on the arduous journey down to the coast. We had now travelled through the greater part of Mashonaland, as, I suppose, the new country must inevitably be called; we had studied the archæology and anthropology of the districts through which we had passed with all the diligence that hard travelling and hard work would allow. Mr. Swan had constructed a map of the route from observations and bearings taken at every possible opportunity by day and by night; and at the same time we had formed opinions on the country from our own point of view, perhaps all the more unbiassed because we were not in search of gold, neither had we pegged out any claims for future development.