Bounded on the north by the Zambesi, the largest and only truly
navigable river in South Africa, whose falls are the largest in the
world, and further by Lake N'Gami and its low-lying territory, and
on the West by the Kalahari, and on the east by the strip of low
country claimed by Portugal. To the extreme left it is largely flat
and arid, like the greater part of South Africa; the central position
has mountain and bush, while along the low-lying river-beds it is
fever-haunted, to the east is a high healthy tableland, well watered
and wooded.
It is the land of Livingstone. Some of us remember on hot Sunday
afternoons, as little children, when no more worldly book than
missionary travels was allowed us, how we sat on our stools and looked
out into the sunshine and dreamed of that land. Of the Garden Island,
where the smoke of the mighty falls goes up, whose roar is heard
twenty-five miles off; of hippopotami playing in the water, and of
elephants and lions, and white rhinoceroses. We had heard of a man on
the north of the Limpopo, who once saw three lions lying under the
trees on the grass like calves, and he walked straight past them, and
they looked at him and did nothing. We had heard of great ruins--ruins
which lay there overgrown with weeds and trees. From there we believed
the Queen of Sheba brought the peacocks and the gold for King Solomon.
We meditated over it deeply. Yes, we should go and see it.[7] Up a
valley, a great white rhinoceros would wade with its feet in the water;
on each side under the trees zebras and antelopes would stand quietly
feeding on the green grass. We would creep up quietly and look at them.
No one but we would ever have seen them before. We would not disturb
them. We would see the giraffes pick the top leaves from the trees, and
elephant-cows walk along with their little calves at their sides. At
night round the fire we would hear the lions roar, and the wild dogs
howl, and sleep with our feet to the fire, and the stars above us; we
would plant seeds on the Garden Island; we would pass lions and they
should not eat us; we would climb over the ruins where the Queen of
Sheba stood! We almost dropped the book from our knees and rose to go.
In that land there were no Sunday afternoons and no boredom; you could
do as you liked. The very names Zambesi and Limpopo drew us, with the
lure of the unknown.
[7] She visited the Falls in 1911.
Even to-day there is still much to be learnt with regard to these
lands. To the west it is inhabited by the Bamangwato, under their chief
Kame; in the centre by the brave warlike Matabele, under the chief
Lobengula; in the east by the mild, industrious Mashonas, on whom the
Matabele raid; and there are to-day the men of the British South Africa
Company looking for gold.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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