49# UVIXGSTOXE'S TRAVELING PARTY. 



ugly, and occasionally, when the Batoka borrowed my 

 looking-glass, the disparaging remark would be made 

 respecting boys or girls who still retained their teeth, 

 " Look at the great teeth S " Some of the Makololo give 

 a more facetious explanation of the custom ; they say 

 that the wife of a chief having in a quarrel bitten her 

 husband's hand, he, in revenge, ordered her front teeth to 

 be knocked out, and all the men in the tribe followed his 

 example ; but this does not explain why they afterwards 

 knocked out their own. 



The Batoka of the Zambesi are generally very dark in 

 colour, and very degraded and negro-like in appearance, 

 while those who live on the high lands we are now ascend- 

 ing, are frequently of the colour of coffee and milk. We 

 had a large number of the Batoka of Mokwine in our 

 party, sent by Sekeletu to carry his tusks. Their greater 

 degradation was probably caused by the treatment of 

 their chiefs — the barbarians of the islands. I found them 

 more difficult to manage than any of the rest of my 

 companions, being much less reasonable and impressible 

 than the others. My party consisted of the head-men 

 afore-mentioned, Sekwebu, and Kanyata. We were 

 joined at the falls by another head-man of the Makololo, 

 named Monahin, in command of the Batoka. We had 

 also some of the Banajoa under Mosisinyane, and last of 

 all, a small party of Bashubia and Barotse under Tuba 

 Mokoro, which had been furnished by Sekeletu because 

 of their ability to swim. They carried their paddles with 

 them, and, as the Makololo suggested, were able to swim 

 over the rivers by night and steal canoes, if the inhabitants 

 should be so unreasonable as to refuse to lend them. 

 These different parties assorted together into messes ; any 

 orders were given through their head-men, and when 

 food was obtained he distributed it to the mess. Each 

 party knew its own spot in the encampment ; and as this 

 was always placed so that our backs shoiild be to the 

 east, the direction from whence the prevailing winds came, 

 no time was lost in fixing the sheds of our encampment. 

 They each took it in turn to pull grass to make my bed, so 

 I lay luxuriously. 



November 26th. — As the oxen could only move at night, 

 in consequence of a fear that the buffaloes in this quarter 

 might have introduced the tsetse, I usually performed the 

 march by day on foot, while some of the men brought on 



