CAMP ON THE SEMOKWE. 143 



brother, and am joining them and some others for 

 about three weeks' hunting in the veldt. I am spin- 

 ning out the time, so that if I find all things favour- 

 able on reaching Mungwato, I can start in April or 

 May for the Zambesi. ... I have seen Vincent, 

 the driver, who is 'death' on Solomon. 1 He said he 

 wanted to kill him, but did not like to do it without 

 your leave, which he asked, but you said it would be 

 rather inconvenient to you just then to have him 

 put out of the way." 



On the 24th, as already stated, the hunters left 

 the Tati, and crossing the Ramakwebani and Inkwisi 

 Rivers struck thence eastwards, and crossed the 

 Sakasusi or Dry River on the 26th, a crowd of Bush- 

 men, with their wives and children, accompanying 

 the waggons. The following day they reached the 

 Semokwe, a fine river surrounded by a sea of green 

 bush stretching in all directions, and here they 

 formed their camp. 2 " In the evening," writes Frank 

 Oates in his Journal after their arrival at this point, 

 " a boy, who comes from the Zambesi and knows 

 the Falls, which he calls ' Metsi-a-tunya' (water- 

 sounding), came and sang, playing on the string of a 

 bow to which a gourd was attached. He sang the 



1 The latter was W. E. Oates's Kaffir driver who, it may be remem- 

 bered, had turned out a consummate rascal. 



2 In the coloured illustration opposite, taken on this river by W. E. 

 Oates, when there the previous year, the dry sandy bed of the Semokwe 

 is distinguished towards the horizon, with tall rushes upon its bank. 

 The large trees, still in leaf, to the left hand of the picture, are 

 acacias, near one of which, still farther to the left, is seen a large 

 ant-hill, used as an oven, in the manner described above (see p. 135). 



