330 LIFE OF DA VID LIVINGSTONE, LL.D. 



had attacked them with guns : they had come upon rapids in the river, but 

 the country around was favourable for land carriage. All were well on the 

 Pioneer, and they were going on to Shupanga, whence they would start up 

 the Shire for Chibisa's, as soon as the rise in the water should be sufficient. 

 As regards ourselves, he told me that there was a great quantity of stores for 

 us at Killimane, which had been brought from the Cape by H.M.S. Rapid, 

 in November, and which he had assisted in landing with considerable trouble 

 and difficulty — another kindness for which we are indebted to -the good 

 Doctor. 



" As I came down the Shire I found the people in considerable affright 

 on account of Mariano in the higher parts of the surrounding country, where 

 an immense number of fugitives had also gathered together : the lower parts 

 were ravaged and almost deserted, burnt villages being the signs of what had 

 been going on, and a number of guns fired only three or four miles distant 

 from an island on which we one night slept, the tokens of what is still going on. 

 Mariano has about 2,000 men, armed with guns for the most part, in his service, 

 and is leagued now with the Portuguese at Killimane for slaving purposes. 



" We have had the greatest difficulty in getting even a very small 

 quantity of seed-corn from the natives. A short time before my departure 

 we sent Charles Thomas, one of the Cape men, up the hills south of our last 

 station to try if he could buy any ; but he had very small success. He went 

 towards the Milanje, and got very near the very place where I and Scudamore 

 were attacked : the people there pleaded famine, not it appears from real 

 want, against which there was abundant external evidence, but because they 

 were evidently unwilling to encourage any traffic or even communication 

 with the English. Charles gave a miserable account of the country in the 

 neighbourhood of our late district, and the route to it from the Shire : it is at 

 least decimated on account of the famine ; he passed through many villages 

 where all the inhabitants, he was told, had died of hunger. Mbami's village 

 itself, with which I presume you are by this time familiar as the first 

 stopping-place on our route to Magomero, is destitute of people ; all have 

 perished except the chief himself and a few of his family. He paid us a visit 

 a short time ago and was then looking himself in a half-starved condition, 

 very different from the stout and hearty personage who greeted us there on 

 our first journey up. With regard to Satchi, and the country between it and 

 Magomero, I think I have informed you in my previous letter. 



" I took a journey with some of our own people down the Shire a short 

 time before I left Mikarango, to try if anything was to be bought in the way 

 of seed or corn, but I could get nothing : there were large crops coming on, 

 but at present the complaint is famine. The people on the right bank, our 

 side of the river, were also in great fear of another Portuguese rebel, of 

 whom I made mention in one of my last letters as staying with Chibisa." 



