Chap. X. bark cloth. 263 



being left in. In deep water, some sorts are taken by 

 lowering fish-baskets attached by a long cord to a float, 

 around which is often tied a mass of grass or weeds, as an 

 alluring shade for the deep-sea fish. Fleets of fine canoes 

 are engaged in the fisheries. The men have long paddles, 

 and stand erect while using them. They sometimes 

 venture out when a considerable sea is running. Our 

 Makololo acknowledge that, in handling canoes, the Lake 

 men beat them ; they were unwilling to cross the Zambesi 

 even, when the wind blew fresh. 



Though there are many crocodiles in the lake, and 

 some of an extraordinary size, the fishermen say that it is 

 a rare thing for any one to be carried off by these reptiles. 

 When crocodiles can easily obtain abundance of fish — 

 their natural food — they seldom attack men ; but when 

 unable to see to catch their prey, from the muddiness of 

 the water in floods, they are very dangerous. 



Many men and boys are employed in gathering the 

 buaze, in preparing the fibre, and in making it into long 

 nets. The knot of the net is different from ours, for they 

 invariably use what sailors call the reef knot, but they 

 net with a needle like that we use. From the amount of 

 native cotton cloth worn in many of the southern villages, 

 it is evident that a great number of hands and heads 

 must be employed in the cultivation of cotton, and in the 

 various slow processes through which it has to pass, before 

 the web is finished in the native loom. In addition to 

 this branch of industry, an extensive manufacture of 

 cloth, from the inner bark of an undescribed tree, of the 

 botanical group, Ccesalpinece, is ever going on, from one 

 end of the lake to the other; and both toil and time 

 are required to procure the bark, and to prepare it by 

 pounding and steeping it to render it soft and pliable. 

 The prodigious amount of the bark clothing worn indi- 

 cates the destruction of an immense number of trees every 



