One lovely morning—the 6th of August—we left our waggons, our cook, and our curios to find their way to Fort Victoria by themselves, and set off. The scenery southwards down the gorge was charming, granite kopje after granite kopje carrying the eye far away into the blue hazy distance. The foliage was thick and shady, and as we halted at a stream to water our animals we plucked large fronds of Osmunda regalis and the tree fern. To our left we passed a huge split rock, just a square block of granite eighty feet high split into four parts, so that narrow paths lead from each side into the heart of it. It was one of the most extraordinary natural stone formations I have ever seen, and the natives call it Lumbo. A relation of Umgabe’s rules over a fantastic kraal, called Baramazimba, hard by this rock; its huts are situated in such inaccessible corners that you wonder how the inhabitants ever get to them. Huge trees sheltered the entrance to this village, beneath which men were seated on the ground playing isafuba, the mysterious game of the Makalangas, with sixty holes in rows in the ground. Ten men can play at this game, and it consists in removing bits of pottery or stones from one hole to the other in an unaccountable manner. We watched it scores of times whilst in the country, and always gave it up as a bad job, deciding that it must be like draughts or chess, learnt by them from the former civilised race who dwelt here. This game is played in different places with different numbers of holes—sometimes only thirty-two holes dug in the ground—always in rows of four. It has a close family relationship to the game called pullangooly of India, played in a fish—the sisoo fish, made of wood—which opens like a chess-board, and has fourteen holes in two rows of seven, small beans being employed as counters. The same game hails also from Singapore and from the West Coast of Africa, where it is played with twelve holes and is called wary. In short, wherever Arabian influence has been felt this game in some form or other is always found, and forms for us another link in the chain of evidence connecting the Mashonaland ruins with an Arabian influence. The Makalangas are also far superior to other neighbouring Kaffir races in calculating, probably owing to the influence of this very game.