CHAPTER II 



NORTH-WESTERN RHODESIA : THE STAGE 

 OF NATURE 



It was in 1904 that I won my first glimpse of 

 the byways of Africa, and the few days that I 

 spent around the Httle mining village of Haenerts- 

 berg in a mountainous region of the Northern 

 Transvaal, where the land dives suddenly down 

 into the fever-ridden haze of the low country, 

 whetted my appetite for a longer sojourn in the 

 lesser-known parts of the continent. Two years 

 later the rolling, rumbling stage-coach bore me 

 farther north to Tsama River on the edge of the 

 Game Reserve, and it was then that I vowed to see 

 the very shrine of savage Africa, and worship 

 at the mysterious high altar to which so many 

 have made a last pilgrimage. 



Thus it was in 1907 I journeyed to Bulawayo, 

 the Victoria Falls and Broken Hill, the then 

 rail-head of the Cape to Cairo line. 



How many people, I wonder, properly appre- 

 ciate what Cecil John Rhodes, Alfred Beit, and 

 those who have taken up the tasks of the two 

 dead Empire-builders have already achieved 

 in the colossal project of connecting up Cape 

 Town with Cairo by rail? How many realize 

 that you can to-day step into a comfortable train 

 at Table Bay and that the metals on which those 

 luxurious coaches run continue for 2,500 miles 

 to the north, that within a week you will be in 



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