.288 VEGETATION OF THE PLAINS. 



does not argue superior morality in other respects, or else 

 Intemese has forgotten any injunctions his mama may 

 have given him not to tell lies. The respect, however, 

 with which he spoke of her was quite characteristic of 

 his race. The Bechuanas, on the contrary, care nothing 

 for their mothers, but cling to their fathers, especially if 

 they have any expectation of becoming heirs to their 

 cattle. Our Bakwain <*uide to the lake, Rachosi, told me 

 that his mother lived in the country of Sebituane, but, 

 though a good specimen of the Bechuanas, he laughed at 

 the idea of going so far as from the Lake Ngami to the 

 Chobe, merely for the purpose of seeing her. Had he 

 been one of the Makalaka, he never would have parted 

 from her. 



We made our beds on one of the islands, and were 

 wretchedly supplied with firewood. The booths con- 

 structed by the men were but sorry shelter, for the rain 

 poured down without intermission till mid-day. There is 

 no drainage for the prodigious masses of water on these 

 plains, except slow percolation into the different feeders 

 of the Leeba, and into that river itself. The quantity of 

 vegetation has prevented the country from becoming 

 furrowed by many rivulets or " nullahs." Were it not 

 so remarkably flat, the drainage must have been effected 

 by torrents, even in spite of the matted vegetation. 



That these extensive plains are covered with grasses 

 only, and the little islands with but scraggy trees, may be 

 accounted for by the fact, observable everywhere in this 

 country, that, where water stands for any length of time, 

 trees cannot live. The want of speedy drainage destroys 

 them, and injures the growth of those that are planted 

 on the islands, for they have no depth of earth not sub- 

 jected to the souring influence of the stagnant water. 

 The plains of I,obale, to the west of these, are said to be 

 much more extensive than any we saw, and their vegetation 

 possesses similar peculiarities. When the stagnant rain- 

 water has all soaked in, as must happen during the 

 months in which there is no rain, travellers are even put to 

 straits for want of water. This is stated on native testi- 

 mony ; but I can very well believe that level plains, in 

 which neither wells nor eullies are met with, may, after 

 the dry season, present the opposite extreme to what we 

 witnessed. Water, however, could always be got by 

 digging, a proof of which we had on our return when 



