1866.] FORCED MARCHES FOR MATAKA'S. 71 



A dead body lay in a hut by the wayside ; the poor thing 

 had begun to make a garden by the stream, probably in 

 hopes of living long enough (two months or so) on wild 

 fruits to reap a crop of maize. 



12th Julij. — A drizzling mist set in during the night 

 and continued this morning, we set off in the dark, how- 

 ever, leaving our last food for the havildar and sepoys 

 who had not yet come up. The streams are now of good 

 size. An Arab brandy bottle was lying broken in one village 

 called Msapa. We hurried on as fast as we could to the 

 Luatize, our last stage before getting to Mataka's ; this 

 stream is rapid, about forty yards wide, waist deep, with 

 many podostemons on the bottom. The country gets more 

 and more undulating and is covered with masses of green 

 foliage, chiefly Masuko trees, which have large hard leaves. 

 There are hippopotami further down the river on its way to 

 the Loendi. A little rice which had been kept for me I 

 divided, but some did not taste food. 



13th July. — A good many stragglers behind, but we push 

 on to get food and send it back to them. The soil all 

 reddish clay, the roads baked hard by the sun, and the 

 feet of many of us are weary and sore : a weary march and 

 long, for it is perpetually up and down now. I counted 

 fifteen running streams in one day : they are at the bottom 

 of the valley which separates the ridges. We got to the 

 brow of a ridge about an hour from Mataka's first gardens, 

 and all were so tired that we remained to sleep ; but we 

 first invited volunteers to go on and buy food, and bring 

 it back early next morning : they had to be pressed to do 

 this duty. 



lAth July. — As our volunteers did not come at 8 a.m.. 

 I set off to see the cause, and after an hour of perpetual 

 up and down march, as I descended the steep slope which 

 overlooks the first gardens, I saw my friends start up at 

 the apparition — they were comfortably cooking porridge for 



