2 44 MATABELE LAND. 
waggon stuck in a very soft muddy place, but Mr. 
Blockley, who was in charge of the trading-station 
here, came with a span of oxen to help him out, and 
the following morning his waggon was taken up 
to where the store was built, on a little stony kopje 
above the watery flats. Mr. Blockley was here in the 
capacity of agent for another trader, then absent — 
Mr. Westbeach — and with him was a Dr. Bradshaw, 
who had been some time in the country. On the 
succeeding day, December 24th, the waggons of two 
other traders, Messrs. Trescott and Wilmore, arrived 
from the Zambesi, the former of whom had lately 
been ill with fever, and was still very deaf and weak, 
and scarcely able to eat anything. He described 
their recent sufferings from fatigue, hunger, sick- 
ness, and the impossibility of keeping dry, as some- 
thing truly wretched. 
Christmas Day was celebrated at the store by 
the cooking and eating of a large plum-pudding 
worthy of the occasion, and the day following Frank 
Oates busied himself with preparing for his walk to 
the Falls. This he intended to accomplish in com- 
pany with Dr. Bradshaw, who had been there before, 
and volunteered to go with him. The 27th was the 
day fixed for the start, and before leaving he wrote 
home in high spirits the following letter to his mother, 
which Messrs. Trescott and Wilmore were to take 
with them when they returned to Tati. It was the 
last he wrote : — 
