LAST LETTER HOME. 245 
" Pantamatenka, December 27///, 1874. 
" I am just about to set off, to walk to the 
Victoria Falls, which are only three days from here. 
This place is somewhere about fifteen miles to the 
north-westward of Daka, a place you will probably 
see in any recent map. Neither place is a town of 
any sort, but each is merely a river flowing to the 
Zambesi. At both rivers waggons stand, as they are 
both out of ' the fly.' The place where I now am is 
quite civilized, as it is a trading -station, and the 
man in charge here has a snug little house, well 
thatched, to keep out the rain. He has lived here 
three years, and is in the employ of Westbeach, who 
is at present at the residence of Sepopo, the Zam- 
besi chief, some distance up the river. His man, 
Blockley, undertakes the charge of my effects whilst 
I proceed to the Falls. 
*' You will be delighted to hear that there is a 
doctor here, who is going to accompany me in my 
walk, and is a great stickler for comforts. He was, 
I think, doctor on a steamer, and at last got to 
the Diamond Fields, and thence came here with 
Westbeach, and has been here now two years. He 
spends a good portion of his time in collecting 
beetles, and is apparently very good-natured. He 
never loses an opportunity of telling you that a 
thing is very unwholesome, the next thing being its 
rapid disappearance into his own interior. There 
was a grand plum-pudding made here on Christmas 
Day. Besides Blockley and the doctor there are 
two traders, who arrived here after I did, on their 
