388 SUPERSTITION AND RELIGION. 



erage on which these poor people were debauching themselves 

 so sadly was found really a pleasant and refreshing article, and 

 one which could hardly be suspected of such dreadful effects to 

 the traveller who only used it moderately. 



The people are attached to their homes, and there will rarely 

 be found a roving disposition among them. The Makololo 

 were astonished that even a prominent chief should never have 

 a " fit of travelling come over him : should never have a desire 

 to see other lands and people." They sit within their hedge of 

 euphorbia as securely as within a wall of stone, and often live 

 to very great age; and, to the great horror of the hydropathists, 

 they cannot attribute a single day of their ages to the yielding 

 element; they perform no ablutions; one old man thought he 

 could remember having "washed once in his life, but so long 

 before that he had forgotten how it felt." 



Superstition, of course, had its place in the lives of the Man- 

 ganja. The muave was there, too, the uncompromising judge 

 between men in all their disputes ; it was depended on to detect 

 the guilty party, and such was the universal confidence in the 

 correctness of its decisions that innocent complainants did not 

 hesitate a moment in resorting to its mysterious bar. But though 

 they so eagerly appeal to the dreadful poison in defence of their 

 characters, the grave is overshadowed by the darkness and mys- 

 tery which everywhere saddens so bitterly the wailings of be- 

 reaved ignorance. " We live only a few days here," said old 

 Chinsunse, " but we live again after death ; we do not know 

 where, or in what condition, or with what companions, for the 

 dead never return to tell us. Sometimes the dead do come back, 

 and appear to us in dreams ; but they never speak nor tell us 

 where they have gone, nor how they fare." 



The splendid country of Manganja offered none of those ad- 

 ventures with ferocious beasts which some readers are on the 

 look out for in accounts of such expeditions, but the charming 

 landscapes and fertile gardens were objects of greater interest. 

 They were a week in crossing these hills. 



The impossibility of carrying their boat by the cataracts, 

 which begin a few miles from Chibisa's village, had compelled 

 them to forego the more distinguished mode of travelling for a 

 time ; but they were certainly well pleased with the change which 



