LECTURE IL 39 



Animals are also plentiful ; and though they took care 

 to keep out of bow-shot, I found that with my gun 

 I could kill as many as were wanted. In my journey 

 beyond the desert, I met with many antelopes of a kind 

 before unknown to naturalists, besides elephants, buffaloes, 

 zebras, &c. 



The chief of the central basin I have described, is 

 named Sekeletu. I proposed to teach him to read, but 

 he said he was afraid it would change his heart, and make 

 him content with only one wife, like Sechele. I told him 

 if he were content with one, what did it matter ? But he 

 said, " No, no ; I always want to have five. I intend to 

 keep them." Seeing I was anxious that he should learn 

 to read, he subjected his father-in-law to learn first, as 

 some men like to see the effect of medicines on other 

 people, before they imbibe them themselves ; and finding 

 that it did him no harm, Sekeletu was taught long enough 

 to gain the ability to read. 



I entered this central basin, in order to find out a 

 path to the sea : I might have gone to the west from 

 Linyanti, but the country in that direction is infested 

 with an insect called Tsetse, whose bite is fatal to 

 most tame animals. To escape the insect plague, I 

 resolved to go northwards and westwards to Loanda, 

 the capital of Angola, a large city containing 12,000 

 inhabitants, a cathedral, and a Jesuit college. Having 

 got down to the West coast, I found I had not accom- 

 plished my object of finding a path to the sea, the 



