502 VALLEY OF THE LOEMBWE. 



straight line toward the place. Sometimes they make mistakes, 

 and are obliged to return to the water they had left. 



Very large tracts of country are denuded of old grass during 

 the winter by means of fire, in order to attract the game to that 

 which there springs up unmixed with the older crop. This new 

 herbage has a renovating tendency, for as long as they feed on 

 the dry grass of the former season they continue in good condi- 

 tion ; but no sooner are they able to indulge their appetites on 

 the fresh herbage, than even the marrow in their bones becomes 

 dissolved, and a red, soft, uneatable mass is left behind. After 

 this commences the work of regaining their former plumpness. 



May 30th. We left Bango, and proceeded to the River 

 Loembwe, which flows to the N.N.E., and abounds in hippo- 

 potami. It is about sixty yards wide, and four feet deep, but 

 usually contains much less water than this, for there are fishing- 

 weirs placed right across it. Like all the African rivers in this 

 quarter, it has morasses on each bank, yet the valley in which it 

 winds, when seen from the high lands above, is extremely beau- 

 tiful. This valley is about the fourth of a mile wide, and it was 

 easy to fancy the similarity of many spots on it to the goodly 

 manors in our own country, and feel assured that there was still 

 ample territory left for an indefinite increase of the world's popu- 

 lation. The villages are widely apart and difficult of access, from 

 the paths being so covered with tall grass that even an ox can 

 scarcely follow the track. The grass cuts the feet of the men ; 

 yet we met a woman with a little child, and a girl, wending their 

 way home with loads of manioc. The sight of a white man always 

 infuses a tremor into their dark bosoms, and in every case of the 

 kind they appeared immensely relieved when I had fairly passed 

 without having sprung upon them. In the villages the dogs run 

 away with their tails between their legs, as if they had seen a 

 lion. The women peer from behind the walls till he comes near 

 them, and then hastily dash into the house. When a little child, 

 unconscious of danger, meets you in the street, he sets up a scream 

 at the apparition, and conveys the impression that he is not far 

 from going into fits. Among the Bechuanas I have been obliged 

 to reprove the women for making a hobgoblin of the white man, 

 and telling their children that they would send for him to bite 

 them. 



