190 After Big Game in Central Africa 



chase about noon to my great vexation, for I bitterly 

 deplore the loss of this magnificent animal. Keturn- 

 ing to the camp, I write my letters for the European 

 mail instead of resting, the men who have brought my 

 correspondence having to leave at dawn the next day 

 to take it to De Borely, who is at a village six days' 

 journey away. I send him with our letters, as I do 

 upon every occasion, some packages of biltong and 

 the natural-history specimens which encumber us. 

 That night, therefore, I sleep at the camp. About 

 ten o'clock the next morning two strangers are 

 pointed out in the distance coming towards us. Yes : 

 there can be no doubt they are coming here. They 

 ask to see me, lay their weapons, rifles and assagais, 

 against the stockade, clap their hands in token of 

 welcome, and sit down at my feet like people who 

 are in no hurry. At my request, one of them 

 explains : " We are people of Bwana Marungo, and 

 this morning we met on the Mafsitis' path 1 your 

 two letter-carriers. We told them that we had seen 

 vultures in the east, in the woods near the Mtudzi. 

 Your carriers then told us that it was a nyama which 

 you had lost yesterday, and that you would perhaps 

 give us a present for coming to tell you." 



"It is the lion ; it is the lion ! " cry my men, who 

 had surrounded us to hear what the strangers had to 

 say. I give the two natives a present of cloth and a 

 package of biltong, and they go on their way rejoicing. 

 We, ourselves, set out at once as quickly as we are 



1 A footpath which led from Tete on the Zambesi to the Angoni 

 country, a former slave-traders' route. 



