624 
THE BANYAI. 
Chap. XXX. 
ment, and would send men with me to Tete who would not lead 
me to any other village. 
The bhds here sing very sweetly, and I thought I heard the 
canary, as in Londa. We had a heavy shower of rain, and I 
observed that the thermometer sank 14° in one hour afterwards. 
From the beginning of February we experienced a sensible 
diminution of temperature. In January the lowest was 75°, 
and that at sunrise ; the average at the same hour (sunrise) 
being 79° ; at 3 p.m., 90°; and at sunset, 82°. In February 
it fell as low as 70° in the course of the night, and the average 
height was 88°. Only once did it rise to 94°, and a thunder¬ 
storm followed this; yet the sensation of heat was greater 
now than it had been at much higher temperatures on more 
elevated lands. 
We passed several villages by going roundabout ways through 
the forest. We saw the remams of a lion that had been killed by 
a buffalo, and the horns of a putokwane (black antelope), the finest 
I had ever seen, which had met its death by a lion. The drums 
beating all night in one village near which we slept, showed that 
some person in it had finished his course. On the occasion of 
the death of a chief, a trader is liable to be robbed, for the 
people consider themselves not amenable to law until a new 
one is elected. We continued a very winding course, in order 
to avoid the chief Katolosa, who is said to levy large sums 
upon those who fall into his hands. One of our guides was a 
fine tall young man, the very image of Ben-Habib the Arab. 
They were carrying dried buffalo’s meat to the market at Tete 
as a private speculation. 
A great many of the Banyai are of a light coffee-and-milk 
colour, and indeed this colour is considered handsome through¬ 
out the whole country,—a fair complexion being as much a 
test of beauty with them as with us. As they draw out their 
hair into small cords a foot in length, and entwine the inner 
bark of a certain tree round each separate cord, and dye this 
substance of a reddish colour, many of them put me in mind of 
the ancient Egyptians. The great mass of dressed hair which 
they possess, reaches to the shoulders, but, when they intend to 
travel, they draw it up to a bunch, and tie it on the top of the 
head. They are cleanly in their habits. 
