FEAR OF "WHITE MAN." 199 



bosoms, and in every case of the kind they appeared immensely 

 relieved when he had fairly passed without having sprung upon 

 them. In the villages jhe dogs run away with their tails be- 

 tween 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 appari- 

 tion, and conveys the impression that he is not far from going 

 into fits. Such things are not calculated to make a man feel 

 more at home there than anywhere else ; but it is hardly won- 

 derful that it is so. A white man must be a singular apparition 

 indeed to those poor people, and the more terrible because all 

 that they have heard of white people has been of a sort to excite 

 their fears. It has been the constant study of the Mambari to 

 prevent, as far as possible, the inhabitants of this secluded 

 region ever thinking of going themselves to the white people. 

 We remember that the Makololo were constantly receiving 

 warnings in which the white people on the coast figured as very 

 monsters. 



After passing lat. 12°, they began to enter the country of 

 animals, but they were very shy, as is generally the case in 

 Londa. It was now about the middle of winter. Of this 

 season Dr. Livingstone says : " The country at this time is cov- 

 ered with yellowish grass quite dry. Some of the bushes and 

 trees are green ; others are shedding their leaves, the young 

 buds pushing off the old foliage. Trees, which in the south 

 stand bare during the winter months, have here but a short 

 period of leaflessness. Occasionally, however, a cold north wind 

 comes up even as far as Cabango, and spreads a wintry aspect 

 on all the exposed vegetation. The tender shoots of the ever- 

 green trees on the south side become as if scorched ; the leaves 

 of manioc, pumpkins, and other tender plants are killed ; while 

 the same kinds, in spots sheltered by forests, continue green 

 through the whole year. All the interior of South Africa has 

 a distinct winter of cold, varying in intensity with the latitudes. 

 In the central parts of the Cape Colony the cold in the winter 

 is often severe, and the ground is covered with snow. At 

 Kuruman snow seldom falls, but the frost is keen. There is 

 frost even as far as the Chobe, and a partial winter in the 



