WITH LIVINGSTONE IN SOUTH AFRICA 147 



through the sleeping flies. I was in advance with the gun and 

 half a dozen Kafirs with axes, with which they had been clearing 

 the way. In the very early morning we reached the river, nar- 

 row, but deep, with steep banks. I asked the guide if we could 

 cross it. ' Do they swim ? ' he asked, pointing to the waggons. 

 ' No,' I answered ; ' where 's the ford ? ' There was none, he said. 

 1 Are there tsetse here?' I inquired, and he replied that there 

 were plenty. 'What are we to do with the animals?' and 

 he told me to drive them as near as possible to the water, 

 into the reeds, as the flies were not there, only in the bush. 

 The pests were beginning to buzz about as the sun rose, so we 

 took the man's advice, and while the others lay down for a rest 

 of an hour or two I volunteered to keep watch. Putting my 

 back against a "tree, I kept my eyes steadfastly fixed on my 

 charge for a time, and then I suppose I must have closed them, 

 though of course I should deny that I was asleep. 



Suddenly I was roused from my reverie by a salutation in 

 Sechuana ' Rumela.' I looked up, and before me stood a tall 

 stalwart Kafir, clothed in a lady's dressing-gown. It came 

 scantily to his knee, and in other parts seemed hardly to have 

 been made for him, and his appearance was so queer that I 

 burst into a laugh. I saw the blood rise in his dusky face as 

 he asked what I was laughing at. ' Why, you have got on a 

 woman's dress from my country,' I told him. ' I don't know 

 about that,' he said, ' but I gave a woman for it last year.' We 

 had come unaware upon the southern limit of the slave trade. 

 It was months since we had last seen any products of European 

 manufacture except those we had brought with us, and here 

 they were in 18 S. Lat., in the middle of South Africa, 1,500 

 to i, 800 miles from any sea. Livingstone woke up, smoothed 

 down my visitor, and inquired what we could do with the 

 cattle. We could not leave them where they were ; they 

 would find nothing to eat, and besides, when the sun got hot 

 the flies would find their way to them. We must drive them 

 across the river, as there were no tsetse there, the man told 

 us ; and we found it was so, the narrowest lines frequently 



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