106 LIVINGSTONE'S LAST JOURNALS. [Chap. IV. 



From Pima's village we had a fine view of Pamalombe 

 and the range of hills on its western edge, the range 

 which flanks the lower part of Nyassa, — on part of which 

 Mukate lives, — the gap of low land south of it behind which 

 Shirwa Lake lies, and Chikala and Zomba nearly due south 

 from us. People say hippopotami come from Lake Shirwa 

 into Lake Nyassa. There is a great deal of vegetation in 

 Pamalombe, gigantic rushes, duckweed, and great quantities 

 of aquatic plants on the bottom; one slimy translucent 

 plant is washed ashore in abundance. Fish become very fat 

 on these plants; one called "kadiakola" I eat much of; it 

 has a good mass of flesh on it. 



It is probable that the people of Lake Tanganyika and 

 Nyassa, and those on the Eivers Shire and Zambesi, are all 

 of one stock, for the dialects vary very little * I took obser- 

 vations on this point. An Arab slave-party, hearing of us, 

 decamped. 



19th September. — When we had proceeded a mile this 

 morning Ave came to 300 or 400 people making salt on a 

 plain impregnated with it. They lixiviate the soil and boil 

 the water, which has filtered through a bunch of grass in 

 a hole in the bottom of a pot, till all is evaporated and a 

 mass of salt left. We held along the plain till we came 

 to Mponda's, a large village, with a stream running past. 

 The plain at the village is very fertile, and has many 

 large trees on it. The cattle of Mponda are like fatted 

 Madagascar beasts, and the hump seems as if it would 

 weigh 100 lbs.f The size of body is so enormous that their 

 legs, as remarked by our men, seemed very small. Mponda 

 is a blustering sort of person, but immensely interested in 



* The Waiyau language differs very much from the Nyassa, and is 

 exceedingly difficult to master : it holds good from the coast to Nyassa, 

 but to the west of the Lake the Nyassa tongue is spoken over a vast 

 tract. — Ed. 



f We shall see that more to the north the hump entirely disappears. 



