MISSION HOUSE PLUNDERED. 3 1 



solitude — were not taken away, but handfuls of the leaves 

 were torn out and scattered over the place. My stock of 

 medicines was smashed ; and all our furniture and clothing 

 carried off and sold at public auction to pay the expenses 

 of the foray. 



I do not mention these things by way of making a pitiful 

 wail over my losses, nor in order to excite commiseration? 

 for though I do feel sorry for the loss of lexicons, dic- 

 tionaries, &c, which had been the companions of my boy- 

 hood, yet, after all, the plundering only set me entirely free 

 for my expedition to the north, and I have never since 

 had a moment's concern for anything I left behind. The 

 Boers resolved to shut up the interior, and I determined to 

 open the country ; and we shall see who have been most 

 successful in resolution — they or I. 



A short sketch of African housekeeping may not prove 

 uninteresting to the reader. The entire absence of shops 

 led us to make everything we needed from the raw mate- 

 rials. You want bricks to build a house, and must forth- 

 with proceed to the field, cut down a tree, and saw it into 

 planks to make the brick-moulds ; the materials for doors 

 and windows, too, are standing in the forest ; and, if you 

 want to be respected by the natives, a house of decent 

 dimensions, costing an immense amount of manual labour, 

 must be built. The people cannot assist you much ; for, 

 though most willing to labour for wages, the Bakwains have 

 a curious inability to make or put things square : like all 

 Bechuanas, their dwellings are made round. In the case 

 of three large houses, erected by myself at different times, 

 every brick and stick had to be put square by my own 

 right hand. 



Having got the meal ground, the wife proceeds to make 

 it into bread ; an extempore oven is often constructed by 

 scooping out a large hole in an anthill, and using a slab of 

 stone for a door. Another plan, which might be adopted 

 by the Australians to produce something better than their 

 " dampers," is to make a good fire on a level piece of ground, 

 and, when the ground is thoroughly heated, place the dough 

 in a small short-handled frying-pan, or simply on the hot 

 ashes ; invert any sort of metal pot over it, draw the ashes 

 around, and then make a small fire on the top. Dough 

 mixed with a little leaven from a former baking, and 

 allowed to stand an hour or two in the sun, will by this 

 process become excellent bread. 



