230 LIFE OF DA VID LIVINGSTONE, LL.D. 



well the value of the metal ; but it is universally asserted by the Portuguese, 

 who are intimately acquainted with their language and modes of thought. 

 It may have been the sly invention of some rogue among them, who wished to 

 baulk the chiefs of their perquisites, for in more remote times these pieces were 

 all claimed by them. 



" Agriculture. — The soil formed by the disintegration of igneous rocks is 

 amazingly fertile, and the people are all fond of agriculture. I have seen 

 maize of nearly the same size of grain as that sold by the Americans for seed 

 in Cape Town. "Wheat, for which one entertains such a friendly feeling, 

 grows admirably near Tete, in parts which have been flooded by the Zambesi, 

 and it doubles the size of the grain at Zumbo. When the water retires the 

 sowing commences. A hole is made with a small hoe, a few grains dropped 

 in, and the earth pushed back with the foot. This simple process represents 

 all our draining, liming, subsoil-ploughing, &c. ; for with one weeding a fine 

 crop is ready for the sickle in four months afterwards. 



" Wheat, sugar, rice, oil, and indigo were once exported in considerable 

 quantities from Tete. Cotton is still cultivated, but only for native manufac- 

 ture. Indigo of a large kind grows wild all over the country. There are 

 forests of a tree which acts as the cinchona near Senna. Does not this show 

 the Divine care over us ? — where fever prevails the remedy abounds. We 

 have also sarsaparilla, calumba-root, and senna leaves in abundance ; the last 

 I believe to be the same as is exported from Egypt. 



" It may not be out of place here to call attention to native medicines as 

 worthy the investigation of travellers. I have always had to regret the want 

 of time to ascertain which were efficacious and which were not, and whether 

 there are any superior to our own. It is worthy of note that the bark, which 

 is similar in properties to that which yields the quinine, has been known as a 

 potent febrifuge by the natives from time immemorial. Our knowledge of 

 the virtues of the bark is comparatively recent. Some may think we have 

 more medicines in the Pharmacopoeia than we know well how to use, but the 

 fact of well-educated persons resorting to Homoeopathy, Holloway's oint- 

 ment, Morison's pills, and other nostrums, may indicate an actual want, to be 

 supplied by something more potent than either raillery or argument. Few 

 such I imagine would in cool blood prefer Parr's life pills to quinine in 

 intermittent fever ; and if we had a remedy for cholera only half as efficacious 

 as quinine in Kilimane fever, it would be esteemed a universal blessing. 

 Many native remedies are valueless, perhaps the majority are so ; but they 

 can cure wounds inflicted by poisoned arrows. In Inhambane and Delagoa 

 Bay a kind of croup prevails : it is probably the Laringismus stridulus, as it 

 attacks and proves very fatal to adults. Singularly enough, it was unknown 

 till the first visit of Potgeiter's Boers to Delagoa Bay, who brought it from 

 parts to the south-west where it prevails, and left it there, though none of 



