14 
SECHELE. 
Chap. T. 
individual is indicated by tlie terms Mo or Le. Thus Mokwain 
is a single person of the Bakwain tribe, and Lekda is a single 
white man or Englishman—^Makoa being Englishmen. 
I attached myself to the tribe called Bakuena, or Bakwains, 
the chief of which, named Sechele, was then living with his 
people at a place called Shokuane. I was from the first struck 
by Ills intelligence, and by the marked manner in wliich we both 
felt drawn to each other. As this remarkable man has not only 
embraced Christianity, but expounds its doctrines to liis people, 
I will here give a brief sketch of his career. 
His great-grandfather Mochoasele was a great traveller, and 
the first that ever told the Bakwains of the existence of white 
men. In his father’s lifetime two white travellers, whom I sup¬ 
pose to have been Dr. Cowan and Captain Donovan, passed 
tlirough the country (in 1808 ), and descending the river Limpopo, 
were, with them party, all cut off by fever. The rain-makers 
there, fearing lest their waggons might drive away the rain, 
ordered them to be thrown into the river. This is the true 
account of the end of that expedition, as related to me by the 
son of the chief at whose village they perished. He remembered, 
when a boy, eating part of one of the horses, and said it tasted 
like zebra’s flesh. Thus, they were not killed by the Bangwaketse, 
as reported, for they passed the Bakwains all well. The Bakwains 
were then rich in cattle ; and as one of the many evidences of the 
desiccation of the country, streams are pointed out where thou¬ 
sands and thousands of cattle formerly drank, but in which 
water now never flows, and where a single herd could not find 
fluid for its support. 
Wlien Sechele was still a boy, liis father, also called Mochoasele, 
was murdered by liis own people for taking to himself the wives 
of liis rich underchiefs. The cliildren being spared, their friends 
invited Sebitiiane, the cliief of the Makololo, who was then in 
those parts, to reinstate them m the cliieftainsliip. Sebituane 
surrounded the town of the Bakwains by night; and just as it 
began to dawn his herald proclaimed in a loud voice that he had 
come to revenge the death of Mochoasele. This was followed by 
Sebitiiane’s people beating loudly on their shields all round the 
town. The panic was tremendous, and the rush like that from a 
theatre on fire, while the Makololo used their javelins on the 
