248 THE KAMVOO. 



ship of the natives. They soon returned with several 

 men, and I was invited to the village. These men 

 were Manganjas, and willingly gave any information 

 I required. One of them informed me that he had 

 seen the English a long time ago, on the Shire, and 

 that they were very good people ; but he was the 

 only man in the tribe that had seen white men. 

 He sat close beside me without the slightest fear, 

 while the others sat staring in silence at a respectful 

 distance, evidently not quite comfortable. The river 

 by which we sat, he informed me, was the Kamvoo, a 

 tributary of the Lesungue ; and though there was but 

 little water in it now, it was a large river in the 

 rains, during which season he said elephants con- 

 stantly travelled the forests by its banks, though at 

 this season there was no game of any kind near. 

 Marimba's, he said, was not very far off, on the other 

 side of the Lesungue. He knew that chief well, and 

 on my asking him to accompany me thither, and pro- 

 mising him some beads, he willingly consented to do 

 so, and ran back to the village to tell his wives that 

 " he would not be home to dinner." 



As soon as it was known in the village that I had, 

 for want of time, refused to go there, the inhabitants 

 flocked out to see me ; and when I left the spot there 

 were at least a hundred men, women, and children 

 squatting on a hillock within fifty yards of my party, 

 feasting their eyes on my novel appearance. 



Shortly after crossing the Kamvoo, the hilly, bar- 

 ren country through which we had been journeying 

 was left behind and a slightly undulating tract en- 

 tered. Here were extensive cotton plantations. 



