xvi INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 



journey in Africa, when in company with Galton; but it was 

 with peculiar feelings that he revisited the spot. ' ( It was now 

 close upon eight years and a half," he says*, " since I was first 

 here. Eight years and a half, the fifth part of a man's life in 

 its full vigour ! What was I at the beginning of this period, 

 and what am I now? Where are the once ruddy cheeks? 

 Where is that elasticity of foot and spirit that made me laugh 

 at hardships and dangers? Where that giant health and 

 strength that enabled me to vie with the natives in enduring 

 the extremes of heat and cold ? Gone ! gone ! ay, for ever ! 

 The spirit still exists unsubdued ; but what with constant care, 

 anxiety, and exposure, the power of performance has fled, leav- 

 ing but the shadow of my former self. What have I accom- 

 plished during these long years ? what is the result of all this 

 toil, this incessant wear and tear of body and mind? The 

 answer, if candid, must be, apparently, very little. This is a sad 

 retrospect of the fifth part of a man's life, whilst still in the 

 pride of manhood. And yet I feel I have not been idle, that 

 I have done as much as any man under similar circumstances 

 could have done ; and so with this poor consolation I must rest 

 content/' 



Omanbonde now contained much more water than when first 

 visited by Andersson ; and, as a consequence, much game was 

 met with in the vicinity, such as the eland, the koodoo, the 

 pallah, the quagga, the elephant, the lion, and the rhino- 

 ceros. During a hunt, however, one of his attendants was 

 unfortunately killed by one of the last-named beasts, that had 

 been previously wounded, which threw a damp over the whole 

 party ; with this exception all Andersson's hunts ended happily, 

 and he was enabled to supply his numerous and hungry fol- 

 lowers with abundance of food. He himself lived sumptuously. 

 "One day"t> he savs > "I dined on beef-steak, on lion, and 

 hump ' de rhinoceros/ done in the ashes * * * * I had never 

 * The Okavango River, p. 113. f Ibid. p. 130. 





