204 
THE CHIEF’S GUAKD. 
Chap. XI. 
to tlie Indian, but with a smaller seed. The soil on all the flat 
parts is a rich dark tenacious loam, known as the “ cotton- 
ground ” in India; it is covered with a dense matting of coarse 
grass, common on aU damp spots in this country. We had the 
Chobe on our right, with its scores of miles of reed occupying the 
horizon there. It was pleasant to look back on the long-extended 
line of our attendants, as it twisted and bent according to the 
curves of the footpath, or in and out behind the mounds, the 
ostrich-feathers of the men waving in the wind. Some had the 
wliite ends of ox-tails on their heads, hussar fashion, and others 
gTeat bunches of black ostrich-feathers, or caps made of lions’ 
manes. Some wore red tunics, or various-coloured prints which 
the clnef had bought from Fleming; the common men carried 
burdens; the gentlemen walked with a small club of rhinoceros 
horn in their hands, and had servants to carry their shields; 
wliile the “Machaka,” battle-axe men, carried their own, and 
were liable at any time to be sent off a hundred miles on an 
errand, and expected to run all the way. 
Sekeletu is always accompanied by his own Mopato, a number 
of young men of his own age. When he sits down they crowd 
around him; those who are nearest eat out of the same dish, for 
the Makololo cliiefs pride themselves on eating with their people. 
He eats a little, then beckons his neighbours to partake. When 
they have done so, he perhaps beckons to some one at a distance 
to^ take a share; that person starts forward, seizes the pot, and 
removes it to his own companions. The comrades of Sekeletu, 
wishing to imitate him in riding on my old horse, leaped on the 
backs of a number of half-broken Batoka oxen as they ran, but, 
having neither saddle nor bridle, the number of tumbles they 
met with was a source of much amusement to the rest. Troops 
of leches, or, as they are here called, “ lechwes,” appeared feeding 
quite heedlessly aU over the flats; they exist here in prodigious 
herds, although the numbers of them and of the “ nakong ” that 
are killed annually, must be enormous. Both are water ante¬ 
lopes, and, when the lands we now tread upon are flooded, they 
betake themselves to the mounds I have alluded to. The Maka- 
laka, who are most expert in the management of their small, 
tliin, light canoes, come gently towards them; the men stand 
upright in the canoe, though it is not more than fifteen or 
