426 A HUNTER'S WANDERINGS ch. 



wheels and nave bands lying about, that had once 

 belonged to the waggons of the ill-fated Makololo 

 mission party, sent by Dr. Livingstone's advice to 

 Sekeletu, nearly twenty years previously. The 

 country now about here is quite uninhabited, and 

 herds of buffaloes roam undisturbed over the pastures, 

 where whilom grazed the flocks and herds of the 

 once all-powerful Makololo. With the buffiilo, too, 

 has come the deadly tsetse fly, which now swarms all 

 along the river's edge. Early on the morning of 

 the 14th we reached Mamele's town, where we 

 remained for two days, arranging preliminaries for 

 the hunt. On the way we came across four lionesses, 

 one of which, a very dark-skinned animal, I shot, 

 making the tenth of these beasts that had fallen to 

 my rifle. Miller and French also wounded two of 

 the others, but lost them in the long grass. 



On the 1 6th, having left one of my waggon- 

 drivers in charge of a hut containing a supply of 

 provisions, ammunition, etc., we again left Mamele's 

 town, and started upon a journey that I would fain 

 pass over in silence, but that I feel it to be my duty 

 to give some account of it. 



Upon setting out from Mamele's village we were 

 accompanied by more than a hundred natives, who 

 went with us in the hope of getting some meat ; for, 

 as the crops had failed this season, the Makubas all 

 along this part of the Chobe were at the time of our 

 visit reduced to great straits for want of food — a fact 

 which the emaciated limbs and protruding stomachs 

 of all but the upper classes brought vividly to one's 

 mind. 



On the afternoon of the 17th we reached the site 

 of the Makololo town of Linyanti. In the evening, 

 the headmen who were accompanying us took some 



