CHARGE OP AN ELEPHANT. 3(31 



a longer distance. My men killed another here, and re- 

 warded the villagers of the Chiponga for their liberality in 

 meal by loading them with flesh. We spent a night at a 

 baobab, which was hollow and would hold twenty men 

 inside. It had been used as a lodging-house by the Babisa. 

 As we approached nearer the Zambesi, the country became 

 covered with broad-leaved bushes, pretty thickly planted, 

 and we had several times to shout to elephants to get out 

 of our way. At an open space, a herd of buffaloes came 

 trotting up to look at our oxen ; and it was only by shooting 

 one that I made them retreat. The meat is very much like 

 that of an ox, and this one was very fine. The only danger 

 we actually encountered was from a female elephant, with 

 three young ones of different sizes. Charging through the 

 centre of our extended line, and causing the men to throw 

 down their burdens in a great hurry, she received a spear 

 for her temerity. I never saw an elephant with more 

 than one calf before. We knew that we were near our 

 Zambesi again, even before the great river burst upon our 

 sight, by the numbers of waterfowl we met. I killed 

 four geese with two shots, and, had I followed the wishes 

 of my men, could have secured a meal of waterfowl for 

 the whole party. I never saw a river with so much animal 

 life around and in it, and, as the Barotse say, " Its fish and 

 fowl are always fat." When our eyes were gladdened by a 

 view of its goodly broad waters, we found it very much 

 larger than it is even above the falls. One might try to 

 make his voice heard across it in vain. Its flow was more 

 rapid than near Sesheke, being often four and a half miles 

 an hour; and, what I never saw before, the water was dis- 

 colored and of a deep brownish red. In the great valley 

 the Leeambye never becomes of this color. The adjacent 

 country, so far north as is known, is all level, and the soil, 

 being generally covered with dense herbage, is not abraded; 

 but on the eastern ridge the case is different : the grass is 

 short, and, the elevation being great, the soil is washed 

 down by the streams, and hence the discoloration which 



