One of our servants had a rencontre that was rather alarming, with one of the crocodiles, from which the river derives its name. He was washing clothes upon the bank, when a dark object emerged from the water, startling him so much that he let the garment slip from his hands. He called out, and had the presence of mind to hurl a big stone at the crocodile’s head, and succeeded in clutching the article back just as the huge creature was snapping at it. An adventure of a somewhat similar character happened to myself. Finding that the Limpopo was only three feet deep just below its confluence with the Marico, I determined to make my way across. We felled several stout mimosa stems, and made a raft; but the new wood was so heavy that under my weight it sank two feet into the water. Convinced that my experiment was a failure, I was springing from one side of the raft on to the shore, when a crocodile mounted the other side—an apparition sufficiently startling to make me give up the idea of crossing for the present.
Taking our departure on the 7th, we proceeded down the stream, having as many as fifteen narrow rain-channels to pass on our way. The whole district was one unbroken forest, and we noticed some very fine hardekool trees. On the left the country belonged to Sechele, on the right to the Transvaal republic.
Though our progress was somewhat slow, being retarded by the sport which we enjoyed at every opportunity, we reached the mouth of the Notuany next evening, having passed the first of the two encampments where the Damara emigrants were gathering together their contingent. It contained about thirty waggons, and at least as many tents; large herds of sheep and cows, under the care of armed sentinels, were grazing around, while the people were sitting about in groups, some drinking coffee and some preparing their travelling-gear. I was rather struck by the circumstance that nearly all the women were dressed in black. Some of the men asked us whether we had seen any Boer waggons as we came along; and on our replying that we had passed a good many emigrants, they expressed great satisfaction, and said that their numbers would now very soon be large enough to allow them to start. They all declared their intention to show fight if either of the Bamangwato kings attempted to molest them or oppose their movements. When I spoke to them about the difficulty they would probably experience in conducting so large a quantity of cattle across the western part of the kingdom, where water was always very scarce, they turned a deaf ear to all my representations. It was just the same with the emigrants at the other camp, whom I saw at Shoshong on my return; they would pay no attention to any warning of danger; nothing could induce them to swerve from their design.
When I pressed my inquiries as to their true motive in migrating, they told me that the president had taken up with some utterly false views as to the interpretation of various passages in the Bible, and that the government had commenced forcing upon them a number of ill-timed and annoying innovations. If their fathers, they said, had lived, and grown grey, and died, without any of these new-fangled notions being thrust upon them, why should they now be expected to submit to the novelties against their will? And another thing which they felt to be peculiarly irritating was, that these state reforms were being brought about by a lot of foreigners, and chiefly by a clique of Englishmen. What President Burgers was aiming at effecting would have an effect the very reverse of remedying the deep-seated evils that oppressed them. It seemed to me that the project which they considered the most obnoxious was that for the formation of a railroad which should connect Delagoa Bay with the Transvaal.
Were it not for their own statements, it would be quite incredible that men, who already have had to struggle hard for their property and farms, should for trivial reasons such as these, and at the instigation of one man, give up their homes and wander away into the interior. The first troop of them, without including stragglers, soon amounted to seventy waggons. They were anxious to get possession of the fine pasturage on the Damara territory, and prepared, in the event of opposition, to drive the Damaras away altogether. They experienced so much difficulty through the scarcity of water, that, after reaching Shoshong, they had to return to the Limpopo, and wait until after a plentiful rain had fallen upon the country they had to traverse.
Under the impression that the emigrants intended to purchase whatever land they required, both the Bamangwato kings granted them a safe pass across their dominions; but as soon as it transpired that they were going to establish themselves by force of arms, Khame immediately withdrew his promise. He could not see why his own territory might not be subject to a like invasion. This led the emigrants openly to avow their determination, in the event of a long drought, to overcome the Matabele Zulus, otherwise they would have to fight their way through the eastern Bamangwatos.
At the end of my journey, after my return to the diamond-fields in 1877, I took up this matter publicly, anxious to do anything in my power to prevent any overt conflict between the emigrants and the noble Bamangwato king. The tenour of my views will be apprehended from the concluding paragraph of my first article, published in the Diamond News of March 24th: “It is absurd for people like these Boers, who are not in a condition to make any progress whatever in their own country, and who regard the most necessary reforms with suspicion, to think of founding a new state of their own.”[1]
Two months after writing that article, I heard they were in expectation of securing the friendship of Khamane, while he was living with Sechele at enmity with Khame. Their scheme of raising him to the throne failed, and no better success attended them in their subsequent attempt to form an alliance with Matsheng.
During 1876 and the following year, the condition of the emigrants, as they still lingered about the Limpopo, changed decidedly for the worse; they had ceased to talk about the conquest of a hostile country, but on the contrary took every means to avoid a battle; many of them had succumbed to fever, and sickness continued to make such ravages amongst them that they resolved to start once more. Again they applied to Khame for a safe passage through his land, but made a move in the direction of the Mahalapsi River, instead of to Shoshong, in order to mislead him. Khame meanwhile kept himself all ready for a battle; he drilled his people every day; and having kept spies on the watch, he soon learnt that the emigrant party had fallen into a state of complete decay; but instead of taking advantage of their condition, and seizing their cattle and property, he sent Mr. Hepburn to ascertain the facts of the case; and when he found that the statements already brought to him were confirmed, he renewed his guarantee to them that they should traverse his country in security; he was really afraid that they would fail in the strength to move on at all. Their difficulties increased every day. Between Shoshong and the Zooga the district is one continuous sandy forest, known amongst the Dutch hunters as Durstland; it contained only a few watering-places for cattle, most of these being merely holes in the sand or failing river-beds; dug over night, they would only contain a few buckets full of water in the morning; and this was all the provision they had for their herds; their bullocks, consequently, became infuriated, and ran away, so that when the concourse reached the Zooga they were in a most helpless plight.
Their want of servants, too, was very trying. I saw quite little children leading the draught-oxen, and young girls brandishing the cumbrous bullock-whips. By slow and painful degrees, however, sadly diminished in numbers by sickness, and having suffered the loss of half their goods, they reached Lake Ngami, only to begin another march as tedious and fatal as that they had already accomplished. At last, what might almost be described as a troop of helpless orphans reached Damara, the sole representatives of the wild and ill-fated expedition.