182 LIFE OF DA VID LIVINGSTONE, LL.D. 



granite hills and the sand afford an easy passage for the water to the number- 

 less small rivers, so that the water is, except during the rainy season, under- 

 going a constant nitration. In the evening two Matabele women came down 

 from the village to see the friend of their chief. They are altogether different 

 in their dress to that of the other tribes. On asking if they knew me, they 

 said, ' We know your size, your nose, and your eyes, but what has become of 

 the long black beard V they inquired. I found that these two respectable- 

 looking matrons, and two others, had been charged with bewitching at head- 

 quarters, and were banished to this distant outpost. This, to say the least, is 

 a merciful punishment for the Matabelian tyrant. 



" Having got in readiness we started again with a company of Bamanguato, 

 who were to be our guides and assistants under one who is their chief, called 

 Mapongko (words or news), and, being as familiar with the Matabele language 

 as his own, he will serve as interpreter. After having passed through a 

 picturesque country — fine water and abundance of pasture — we halted at what 

 is called the M'akue river, having travelled 18 miles in 9 hours, with frequent 

 hindrances from cutting down trees and seeking roads across ravines. Last 

 night we slept near some large masses of granite, near a range of pools ; the 

 night cold, with heavy dew, although the atmosphere appeared dry during the 

 day. The country exceedingly picturesque, and the mountains and trees number- 

 less as their shapes. Wherever the eye is directed nothing but hills on hills 

 rise in endless succession ; nearly all are covered with enormous granite blocks 

 and trees, though, to a superficial observer, there appears to be scarcely any 

 soil. We also passed hills, some not less than 6 miles in circumference, 

 exactly resembling the half or third part of a perfect sphere above the ground, 

 solid granite, and, to the eye, as smooth as an orange, without a single tuft of 

 grass or loose pebble on the whole surface. Having scrambled part of the way 

 up such granite globes it appeared to me that not a particle, not even grains of 

 sand had lain on them since washed by the waters of the flood. The alluvial 

 deposits accumulated in the valleys between these hills are exceedingly rich, 

 and send forth luxuriant brushwood and grass. Sometimes the granite crops 

 out in large flat masses, and having been washed by the rains of some thousand 

 summers, these are employed as threshing-floors, in the vicinity of the native 

 gardens. Blocks rising above trees, on the tops of hills, might, without much 

 effort of the imagination, be taken for ancient castles, surrounded with broken 

 ramparts. I examined a single block near to where we passed, on an entirely 

 level surface of rich soil. It exhibited a perpendicular face of 50 by 40 ft., 

 smooth as if it had been chiseled, and looked as if intended for a base to some 

 stupendous monument. Among the debris of the surrounding hills are large 

 quantities of quartz, blue stone, mica, slate. It is very evident, from the 

 appearance of these mountains, that there have been no earthquakes here 

 since a very remote period, or otherwise thousands of boulders of great 



