490 
RETURN OF THE DETACHMENT. 
30, 31 July, 
was, and the strength of his party ; as they remarked, he said, 
when they saw us, that we were only eleven in number, and that 
none excepting two were large men or seemed to be very strong. 
The detachment of Bachapins who were sent in pursuit of these 
robbers, returned on the next day, without having fallen in with 
them or with any of the cattle. I found that the search had been 
soon given up, and that the whole of this display of spirit and 
promptitude had ended in nothing. Mattivi, as if ashamed that I 
should see any appearance of pusillanimity, and to cover his want of 
resolution in tamely submitting to the loss, told me that he had now 
sent out only a few men merely to trace the direction in which the 
oxen had been driven off, and to ascertain what tribe had taken 
them ; but that after my departure, he should go himself with a large 
army and bring them away with him, even should they have been 
carried to the enemy's chief town ; and that his reason for not 
doing so immediately, was, the fear that, if he left me alone and 
unprotected, the Nuakketsies, who would know of my situation, 
would send a party to murder me and all my men. 
In this story he forgot that I knew the robbers were Batammakas, 
and not Nuakketsies. Which proves that in Africa, as well as in 
Europe, he who attempts to fabricate a tale, or make a misrepresent- 
ation to answer his own views, will surely betray himself, and give 
evidence that he has been wilfully guilty of an untruth. But 
Mattivi's inveterate hatred against the latter tribe, was the real cause 
of his casting the odium of the robbery upon them, in order to raise 
in my mind a prejudice against them and to deter me from any idea 
of travelling into their country. 
When i questioned Muchunka, who was at all times ready to 
support whatever Mattivi asserted, why those three Nuakketsies were 
suffered to trade at Litakun and were entertained as friends, if they 
were believed to be spies and robbers ; he replied, that to put a man to 
death in their town, even an enemy who visits them in a peaceable 
manner, is viewed as a very ' ugly' act ; it being only in battle, that 
they kill their enemies. And in order to give me a suitable idea oF 
the magnitude and power of the Bachapin nation, he added, that if, 
