LUXURY OF A BATH. 151 
Matabele king ; and the other, a man named 
Dawson. 
" On my birthday I thought of you all, and old 
times — and had a good wash/ ... I hope not 
to be more than a week or so here in all, before 
returning to Tati, en rotite for the Falls. Selous, the 
hunting youth above mentioned, set off to-day. His 
partner, George Wood, a Yorkshireman, is waiting 
for him at Tati. They are both professional ivory 
hunters, and have a good deal of roughing it to do. 
Selous was once lost for four days and three nights 
in the veldt. The morning of the first day, when 
he left the waggons, he had nothing but a cup of 
coffee, and had neither a drop of water nor a morsel 
of food of any description till the evening of the 
fourth day, when he found his way back, and got 
some milk of a native. He thinks he could have 
held out another day. 
" The brothers Garden are going to the Zambesi 
also, the same way. There is another way of 
reaching the Falls from here, shorter than the Tati 
road, but at certain seasons deficient in water. It 
is to the left of the Tati road. I should have 
preferred it, but wanted to leave some things at 
Tati, and was not sure of finding water, going by 
it. It appears, however, it would have been all 
right, had I decided on that route. They tell me 
^ A rare luxury at the present time, only to be indulged in on 
great or special occasions, owing to the increasing scarcity of water 
with the cessation of the rains. " I am miserable," he writes one day 
about this time, "for want of water to wash myself in, ever so super- 
ficially." 
