PREPARATIONS FOR A MOVE. 
437 
upon them on foot, when the best of the herd must 
have bitten the dust had my poor Ferus been alive. 
Those rascally Mangwatos stole my last spoon and 
axe, a box of caps, and my knife also, and very likely 
many more things that I have not yet missed. 
Dec. 2nd [Sunday). — Lopepe .—This is the last 
water for three long days, and there are no signs of 
rain, though it is so late in the year. I hear the 
Bakwains at Sechele’s State are all starving : a com¬ 
fortable prospect before me. I am getting all in 
preparation for a move—cask, water-vats and cala¬ 
bashes full, rheims and neck-straps mended, that we 
may have no cause of delay or hindrance of any kind 
that a little foresight might have avoided, and I shall 
do all I can to get over this much-dreaded part of 
the road to Kapong, after which, except the flooded 
rivers, it is all plain sailing to Natal. I have rested 
here the best part of three days to recruit my poor 
oxen, but they have not benefited much, as the 
grass is too scarce. I have broken in three young 
ones from Bamangwato, but they only help in the 
day, as they plague too much yet for night-work, 
and are continually getting wrong in the yoke. I 
have bagged this time with great difficulty one pallah 
and one springbuck, and should be very glad if I had 
with me any young ardent sportsman to take this job 
off my hands, as it begins now to pall upon me, and, as 
soon as ever I have procured sufficient for the day, I 
immediately make the best of my way back. It is no 
longer sport; the days are now gone by when I 
