THE DROUGHT AND HOPO. 63 



During the three years — the earlier years of Livingstone's 

 settlement — there was almost a continuous drought. Sechele 

 had been a noted rain-doctor ; now he would not do anything. 

 They felt that Christianity was to account for their parched 

 fields and famished herds and their own great suffering. They 

 were slow to embrace Christianity. To Dr. Livingstone they 

 would say, "We like you as well as if you had been born 

 among us, but we wish you to give up that everlasting preach- 

 ing and praying. You see we never get rain, whilst those 

 tribes who never preach and pray have plenty." Indeed, with 

 such impressions, there is no difficulty in comprehending their 

 feelings, if we can only realize their distress during those three 

 years — the rivers running dry, the leaves dying on the trees, 

 needles retaining their polish perfectly lying in the street, the 

 mercury standing at 134° three inches under ground. Only the 

 long-legged black ants seemed to prosper ; they only deserve to 

 be said to live; everything else seemed ready to give up. They 

 toiled on, under the cover of recurring darkness, year in and 

 year out ; somehow or other finding moisture for their mortar, 

 and rearing their singular mansions. It was a mockery. Birds 

 suffered, beasts suffered, reptiles suffered, fish suffered, beetles 

 placed on the surface died in half an hour, man suffered ; only 

 the chambers of these strange creatures were surprisingly humid. 

 It was a question for the curious. 



Sechele's people did nobly. They sold ornaments ; the 

 women did that. There are women in Africa. It is woman's 

 mission to arise to her noblest work in times which crush men. 

 It is the mission of African women. They sold ornaments — 

 for corn — to other tribes. The men resorted to the Hopo; this 

 is a mammoth trap, which is set for the giants of the wilderness. 

 If you look at the picture, it is easily understood. It is made 

 of huge piles driven firmly in the ground, and boughs of trees 

 closely interwoven with the piles. There is a strong barricade 

 formed in this way ; it extends about a mile. At the point of 

 the V formed by these hedges there is a lane ; at the end of the 

 lane a pit. The men easily enclose within these hedges a large 

 number of animals, which, terrified by the furious yells of the 

 hunters and their sharp javelins, rush madly along the converg- 

 ing hedges and the narrow lane until the treacherous pit re- 

 4 



