6 INTRODUCTORY 



ditions of his lease whereby he covenanted to carry 

 out various schemes of improvement within the 

 area allotted to him. 



The remaining class I have referred to as one 

 from which the colony derived in the past but little 

 benefit was the former Zambezian trader. This 

 latter type was probably the worst of all. Twenty 

 or thirty years ago, the conditions of life and resi- 

 dence in the Zambezi Valley were perhaps twenty 

 or thirty times worse than at present. It followed, 

 therefore, that such trading houses as at that time 

 carried on business had fewer competitors to 

 contend with, less tiresome, embarrassing regu- 

 lations to get in the way of their rough-and-ready 

 methods, and far more incitement, arising from 

 deadly climate and daily funerals, to make as much 

 money as possible in the shortest time, and to 

 betake themselves to healthier and more congenial 

 atmospheres at the earliest possible moment. 

 About this time, therefore, large fortunes were in 

 some cases realised, not always, it is to be feared, 

 by means the most legitimate ; but the traders of 

 that time were, as I have said, of a rough-and-ready 

 type, whose integrity was elastic, and whose ideas 

 of the fitness of things were bounded by a horizon 

 which stood for gain. These three predominating 

 classes were, unconsciously perhaps, doing the 

 country more injury than they had any idea of 

 They were taking everything out, and putting 

 nothing back. These were the days of which very 

 old residents still speak reverently, with many a 

 reminiscent sigh, and, I doubt not, many an inward 

 pang at the bitter recollection of opportunities lost, 



