i883.] 
Among the Barotse. 
89 
a God, a Saviour ! When told in their old age the precious 
gospel message of life, they marvel at the fact that they have 
lived so long without having heard it. The heathen wonder — 
they are surprised, they cannot understand — how it is that those 
who have known these things, and have believed in God and in 
His Son, have never come to warn them, and tell them of the 
true God. These words come from the very heart of Africa; 
they are not the words of one man only, but of many. 
A CHAPTER IN AFRICAN HISTORY. 
Let me now give a slight history of the Upper Zambesi tribes, 
so far as I can. 
Somewhere between 18 10 and 1820 a branch of the Basuto 
tribe, called the Makololo, lived in the country now occupied 
by the Batlapins, in the south of Bechuanaland. Two brothers, 
Sebituane and Mosheshi, had a dispute about the chieftainship, 
so they agreed to separate, Sebituane going north, Mosheshi 
sometime afterwards going south. Sebituane fought his way 
through the Bechuana tribes, taking many oxen from all the 
tribes, and went on, greedy of more conquests. After fighting 
and beating off the Matabele, he arrived at the Zambesi in the 
year 1823. (I obtained this date from Senhor Porto.) He was 
soon master of the Batoka country, and in that same year came 
up the river as far as Shesheke. All the Mashi tribe and the 
Mangeti up the Chobe river yielded to him, after great slaughter, 
and he was soon chief of an immense country. 
Just then Malunda, the chief of the Barotse, died, and, as is 
often the case here, left no acknowledged heir to the chieftain- 
ship. Two supposed heirs were going to quarrel about it, when 
the strongest, and evidently the wisest, went down the river to 
the great chief Sebituane, and invited him to take possession of 
the Barotse kingdom. Of course might was right in this case, 
and the weaker party of the Barotse fled far up the Zambesi 
river, and, I am told, enjoy a very happy and peaceful little 
kingdom there all to themselves in a fine healthy country. 
Sebituane put to death many of the old men and would-be kings 
among the Barotse. Malunda left three young sons ; too young 
to be kings, poor things. Their names were — Mokobeso, Ditia, 
Sepopo. Mokobeso was betrayed to the Makololo while in 
