Chap. XXX. 
FACE OF THE COTJXTEY. 
625 
As we did not come near liuman liabitations, and could only 
take short stages on account of the illness of one of my men, I 
had an opportunity of observing the expedients my party resorted 
to in order to supply their wants. Large white edible mush¬ 
rooms are found on the anthills, and are very good. The 
mokuri, a tuber which abounds in the Mopane country, they 
discovered by percussing the ground with stones ; and another 
tuber, about the size of a turnip, called “ bonga,” is found in the 
same situations. It does not determine to the joints like the 
mokuri, and in winter has a sensible amount of salt in it. A 
fruit called “ ndongo ” by the Makololo, dongolo ” by the 
Bambiri, resembles in appearance a small plum, which becomes 
black when ripe, and is good food, as the seeds are small. 
Many trees are known by tradition, and one receives curious bits 
of information in asking about different fruits that are met with. 
A tree named shekabakadzi ” is superior to all others for 
making fire by friction. As its name implies, women may even 
readily make fire by it when benighted. 
The country here is covered over with well-rounded shingle 
and gravel of granite, gneiss, with much talc in it, mica schist, 
and other rocks which we saw in situ between the Kafue and 
Loangwa, There are great mounds of soft red sand slightly 
coherent, which crumble in the hand with ease. The gravel 
and the sand drain away the water so effectually, that the trees 
are exposed to the heat during a portion of the year, without 
any moisture; hence they are not large, like those on the 
Zambesi, and are often scrubby. The rivers are all of the sandy 
kind, and we pass over large patches between this and Tete, 
in which, in the dry season, no water is to be found. Close on 
our south, the hills of Lokole rise to a considerable height, and 
beyond them flows the Mazoe with its golden sands. The great 
numbers of pot-holes on the sides of sandstone ridges, when 
viewed in connection with the large banks of rolled shingle and 
washed sand which are met with on this side of the eastern ridge, 
may indicate that the sea in former times rolled its waves along 
its flanks. Many of the hiUs between the Kafue and Loangwa, 
have their sides of the form seen in mud banks left by the tide. 
The pot-holes appear most abundant on low grey sandstone ridges 
here; and as the shingle is composed of the same rocks as the 
2 s 
