106 SAILORS' GARDEN. Chap. IV. 



1856, the year when Dr. Livingstone came down the river. 

 It is astonishing to any one who has seen the works for 

 irrigation in other countries, as at the Cape and in Egypt, 

 that no attempt has ever been made to lead out the water 

 either of the Zambesi or any of its tributaries; no 

 machinery has ever been used to raise it even from the 

 stream, but droughts and starvations are endured, as if 

 they were inevitable dispensations of Providence, incapable 

 of being mitigated. 



Feeling in honour bound to return with those who had 

 been the faithful companions of Dr. Livingstone, in 1856, 

 and to whose guardianship and services was due the accom- 

 plishment of a journey which all the Portuguese at Tette 

 had previously pronounced impossible, the requisite steps 

 were taken to convey them to their homes. 



We laid the ship alongside of the island Kanyimbe, 

 opposite Tette ; and, before starting for the country of the 

 Makololo, obtained a small plot of land, to form a garden 

 for the two English sailors who were to remain in charge 

 during our absence. We furnished them with a supply 

 of seeds, and they set to work with such zeal, that they 

 certainly merited success. Their first attempt at African 

 horticulture met with failure from a most unexpected 

 source ; every seed was dug up and the inside of it eaten 

 by mice. " Yes," said an old native, next morning, on 

 seeing the husks, " that is what happens this month ; for it 

 is the mouse month, and the seed should have been sown 

 last month, when I sowed mine." The sailors, however, 

 sowed more next day ; and, being determined to outwit 

 the mice, they this time covered the beds over with grass. 

 The onions, with other seeds of plants cultivated by the 

 Portuguese, are usually planted in the beginning of April, 

 in order to have the advantage of the cold season ; the 

 wheat a little later, for the same reason. If sown at the 

 beginning of the rainy season in November, it runs, as 



