LAST LETTER HOME. 247 



was a grand plum-pudding made here on Christmas 

 Day. Besides Blockley and the doctor there are 

 two traders, who arrived here after I did, on their 

 way from the Zambesi. One has been ill and the 

 doctor prohibited him plum-pudding, so there were 

 four of us in all. We ate nothing but pudding on 

 Christmas Day and the day following, with scarcely 

 an exception. The men had another pudding. My 

 man turns out to have been originally a cook, and 

 when he likes can cook well. The doctor was found 

 to be five pounds heavier after dinner than before it 

 on Christmas Day. He strongly urged upon all of 

 us the desirability of moderation ; but no one seemed 

 to pay much attention to him, and he certainly did 

 not practise what he preached. He has been to the 

 Falls before, and in the rainy season too, so he 

 knows what he is undertaking in going with me. I 

 expect he will make very slow marches, but so much 

 the better. I am going to take with me the identical 

 tent I had with me in America, and which proved 

 so effectual a shelter from the snows of the Rocky 

 Mountains. There was a grand idea in the doctor's 

 mind of taking a lot of cold plum-pudding with us on 

 our walk, but the last morsel disappeared last night. 

 However, we shall not be badly off for supplies. 



" From Tamasanka, where I last wrote to you, 1 

 and where the traders were waiting till April, I was 

 nine days in getting here. The waggon -road all 

 the way goes through thick bush and heavy sand. 

 There are no rivers, but abundance of pools in the 



1 This letter was not received in England. 



