4 
The Victoria Falls. — Zambesi River. 
nothing of the drizzh'ng mist, but tell me if heart of man ever 
conceived anything more gorgeous than those two lovely 
rainbows, so brilliant that the eye shrinks from looking on 
them, which, rising from the abyss, deep as the solar rays 
can penetrate it, overarch spray, rook and forest, till, at 
the highest point, they fail to find refracting moisture to com- 
plete the arch. 
Eastward Ho ! Still eastward, through mud, wild date- 
palms, grassy swamps, and vine-tangled forests with ever- 
dripping leaves, scene after scene of surpassing grandeur 
presenting itself, till the imagination is bewildered and em- 
barrassed by so much magnificence. Now we pass the central, 
or as we suppose it. Garden Island, dividing the fall into two 
great masses, and interposing its breadth of bare projecting 
precipice. Its extent as yet we cannot tell, for its farther end 
is lost in spray. In some places the forest reaches quite to the 
verge, the trees appearing as if the keen wind blowing upward 
from the gulf had shorn off' their over-hanging branches level 
with the cliff". Here and there are broad intervals of dark 
purple rock, wet and slippery with gelatinous weeds. I approach 
the edge, and look with awe into the troubled narrow stream 
beneath. The influence of the water rushing down, eternally 
downward, seems to meet a response within me, and kneeling 
down, I rest one hand upon the edge to look further : but now 
comes my little Bush-boy to rescue me from the supposed 
danger, nor will he be satisfied till we have removed from the 
verge. 
Again our progress is checked, and our attention called 
from the glories of inanimate nature to the necessity of guard- 
ing against other emergencies of the wilds. The open sky 
beyond shows that we have nearly reached the termination of 
the forest, when Chapman stops suddenly. I see nothing yet, 
but the poised rifle and attitude of precaution show that some- 
thing more than ordinary is before us. I step backward, round 
the corner of a bush, and there within seventy yards are a 
hundred bufiialoes ; fortunately to windward of us. We tire 
into them, and they charge wildly round to leeward, seeking to 
sniff" our wind. If they gain this, their next charge wall be 
directly at us. Bullet after bullet stops and heads them off", 
and though they see us plainly, they cannot determine on a 
direct charge without another effort to get to leeward and 
ascertain our quality by the scent. At length they turn and 
rush toward the Fall, crushing through palm brake and rotten 
timber till, at full speed, they gain the rocky headland, and we 
hold our breath in momentary terror lest they should rush 
over. Now they halt on the very edge, their dark massive 
forms stand out in bold relief against the misty clouds, and 
again, as the bullets tell upon them, they take refuge in the 
palm brake, the wounded lagging in the covert as they go. 
(View No. 6.) 
One with bleeding jaws charges directly at us, forcing us 
in turn to take shelter behind the stoutest trees, and presently 
my little fellow calls my attention to one standing, crippled, 
between the feathery leaves of a palm and a diagonally 
stunted tree. As I prepare to fire, he rises to charge, and I 
take cover till I estimate his remaining strength, returning to 
deliver my fire when his fruitless effort is over, the Bushman 
immediately climbing the tree and throwing his assegai from 
the branches, while a Makalaka, carrying an empty musket, 
begs hard for a charge and a bullet, which is refused only 
because we have none to fit the bore. 
Still there are others badly wounded in the brake — invisible, 
though we can hear them bellowing within ten yards, and 
extreme caution is necessary in approaching so dangerous a 
beast. Chapman, as the more experienced hunter, now takes 
the lead, and I follow closely to support him. Peering closely 
through the openings of the arching leaves, at length he sees 
the feet, and firing shot after shot where he thinks the body 
ought to be, retreats to cover after every discharge. After a 
while all is silent, and leaving the animals to die, we secure 
part of the flesh of our first victim, and hasten to cheer the 
hearts of our party with tidings of the glorious feast awaiting 
them. 
A second encounter in the more open country, with the 
herd retreating from the Falls, and reinforced by a much larger 
body coming down to enjoy the spray-shower, resulted in the 
death of a fine cow, making a total of six killed during the day, 
beside the rhinoceros, which can hardly escape the keen-eyed 
natives, who watch the hovering of the vultures, and seldom 
think it necessary to trouble us with information of game that 
dies at a distance from our camp. 
A couple of fine men, bearing the large heavy spears used 
on the river, arrived soon after, having been sent by Moshotlani, 
the petty chief of the ferry, to learn the object of our visit. 
Chapman answered that, knowing the wish of Sekeletu to 
engage in commerce with white men, he had brought up a few 
goods for preliminary traffic ; but as land-carriage was long and 
tedious, and the loss of cattle by lung-sickness and tsetse-fly 
heavy, he wished to hire ten men for such pay as might be 
agreed upon, to assist us in building a boat, near Sinamanes, 
to navigate the river down to Tete, whence goods could be 
brought up at prices more nearly in accordance with their 
original cost. 
The death of the unfortunate missionaries was a delicate 
subject for persons situated as we were to touch upon ; for we 
cannot exonerate the chief from having hastened their death 
by harsh treatment and neglect, if not, as native testimony 
assures us, by actual poison. Certainly he plundered the 
survivors, and insulted them by disinterring and brutally 
mutilating the corpses of their dearest relatives. 
In answer to an allusion on the subject, we told them it 
had been reported in Cape Town that Sekeletu had poisoned 
them, and that the people were grieved and indignant at the 
cruel deed ; but we were private men, and had no authority 
to speak on so serious a subject, which had better be left to be 
discussed between the chief and such persons as might be 
delegated by our own Government. 
At night I observed stars which gave the latitude of the 
Falls as 17° 55' 4" south. 
Thursday, July 24th. — Wakened about daybreak by the 
never varying, unceasing roar of the cataract, we saw the dull, 
gray spray cloud rising in irregular columns, and spreading 
its dark form against the eastern sky, diff'ering from smoke 
only in that it did not rise or fall beyond a certain limit, and 
did not drift away, but remained overhanging the spot from 
which it rose, its spreading palm-like top just swayed and 
altered by the gentle south-east breeze. I watched with 
interest as the sun rose about 30° on one side of it, but was 
somewhat disappointed in the effects I had anticipated. No 
play of brilliant colours took place on its illuminated edge, nor 
did it show more transparency or light and shade than a 
diff"used cloud of steam under the same circumstances. Its 
angular height, measured with the sextant, varied from 
5° 50' to 7° 48', which, estimating our distance at one mile, 
gave, with 90 feet for the height of the trees and 350* for 
the depth of the fall, nearly 1,200 feet as the actual height 
to which the spray rises from the bottom of the chasm. 
This is, of course, only an approximation ; and it must be 
remembered that the height and apparent volume are greatly 
diminished as the heat of the dav comes on, while during; the 
coolness of the early morning we thought it rose higher. In 
the wet season, when the flood rises six feet or more, it must 
be truly magnificent ; and, in fact. Chapman has since seen it 
from a hill more than 50 miles distant. (View No. 2.) 
Shifting the camp to the ferry landing, about a mile higher 
up, I returned along the bank of the river, with my young 
friend Edward Barry, getting peep after peep at the water as 
from a swiftly-flowing stream it grew into a rapid, rushing with 
* I am told that Sir Rieliard Glyn, who has since measured it, could not reach the bottom with a line of 400 feet. 
