504 THE LAKE AT MOLAMBA. Chap. XXIV. 



in tone, at different ages, here as all over the world. We 

 have been perpetually reminded of home and family by the 

 wailings which were once familiar to parental ears and heart, 

 and felt thankful that to the sorrows of childhood our children 

 would never have superadded the heartrending woes of the 

 slave-trade. 



Taking Chinsamba's advice to avoid the Mazitu in their 

 marauding, we started on the 5th September away to the 

 N.E., and passed mile after mile of native cornfields, with 

 an occasional cotton-patch. Many of the thick corn-stalks 

 had been broken in the haste of the reapers, and lay across 

 the paths much to our inconvenience in walking. Men 

 and women were eagerly reaping the remaining ears, and 

 in haste conveying them to the stockades which were 

 crammed with corn, and contained each three or four thou- 

 sand souls ; some took us for Mazitu, and fled in dismay ; 

 but returned when assured by our guides that we were the 

 English, who had sailed up the Lake. So much corn had 

 been scattered along the paths by the Mazitu and the fugi- 

 tives in their haste, that some women were collecting and 

 winnowing it from the sand. Three dead bodies, and seve- 

 ral burned villages, showed that we were close upon the 

 heels of the invaders, and that the system of securing " kind 

 masters " in the Zulu's hands is a sad system enough. All 

 that can be alleged in its favour is, that it entails much less 

 loss of life than that which secures " kind masters " across 

 the ocean for far fewer survivors. 



After a long march through cornfields, we passed over 

 a waterless plain about N.N.W. of the hills of Tsenga to 

 a village on the Lake, and thence up its shores to Chitanda. 

 The banks of the Lake were now crowded with fugitives, who 

 had collected there for the poor protection which the reeds 

 afforded. For miles along the water's edge was one con- 



