FOUNDING THE PROTECTORATE 
83 
had re-engaged at Zanzibar in 1889; and fifteen Makua, engaged with the con¬ 
sent of the Portuguese authorities at Mozambique. The James Stevenson was a 
river steamer of about forty tons burden, worked by a stern wheel, and with 
fairly comfortable cabin accommodation, and an upper deck. In this steamer 
we pursued our course up the river, until we reached Serpa Pinto’s camp, 
which was a little distance below the confluence of the Ruo and the Shire. I 
had been startled, on reaching Quelimane, to learn from the Portuguese officials 
there, that Major Serpa Pinto, after journeying to Sena on the Lower Zambezi 
with his expedition, had suddenly, and abruptly, deflected his course northwards 
to the Shire, and was apparently making for the Makololo country, and the 
Shire Highlands. Major Serpa Pinto had been 
apprised of my' coming, and when the James 
Stevenson drew near he dispatched an officer and 
a boat, so that I might land and see him. I found 
Serpa Pinto surrounded by a staff of white officers, 
and was informed that he had with him over seven 
hundred Zulu soldiers. 1 
The Major received me in a little hut, and after 
insisting on my sharing his afternoon tea, we began 
to discuss the political situation. He informed me 
that he sought my intervention with the Makololo 
people, to persuade them to allow him to pass un¬ 
hindered through their country, as he was on his 
way to Lake Nyasa in charge of a Scientific Expedi¬ 
tion. “ We go,” he said, “ to visit that Portuguese 
subject, Mponda, at the south end of Lake Nyasa.”' 2 
I replied to Major Serpa Pinto, “If you are only in 
charge of a Scientific Expedition, you need, at most, 
an escort of fifty soldiers ; but the Makololo are sure 
to view your journey with distrust if you attempt to 
bring so large an armed force into the country; 
moreover, your Government has distinctly assured 
us that the object of your mission was the Upper 
Zambezi, and not the Shire. Consequently, if you 
take any political action north of the Ruo, which we 
consider, provisionally, to be the Portuguese limit, 
you will oblige me, on my part, to go beyond my 
immediate instructions and effectively protect the 
interests of Her Majesty’s Government. If you merely wish to pass through 
the country for scientific purposes we will travel together, and I will do my 
best to persuade the Makololo to offer no opposition.” 
Major Serpa Pinto did not give any very definite reply to these remarks 
of mine, merely reiterating his hope that I would prevail on the Makololo 
to offer no opposition to his passage; otherwise he would be obliged to fight 
them. 
I proceeded on my way in the James Stevenson , and soon afterwards 
1 Many of these men were inhabitants of Gazaland and Inyambane, but a few ot them were 
undoubtedly Zulus, who had been recruited in Swaziland and in the vicinity of Delagoa Bay. 
2 I was aware that the Portuguese had endeavoured by means of Senor Cardozo, the only Portuguese 
explorer who had at that date reached the shores of Lake Nyasa, to conclude a treaty with Mponda, 
but it was common knowledge that although he had received the Mission in a friendly way, he had not 
signed the treaty. 
