Nearly opposite Impalera was a little creek overhung by a fine moshungulu. Understanding that this was the usual landing-place for natives coming across the river, I gave orders for a little grass-hut to be put up there for my use. The Chobe was here between 200 and 300 yards across, and so deep that its water was of quite a dark blue colour. As I strolled along beside it I saw considerable numbers of a small water-lily floating on its surface; the species seemed to produce a very limited quantity of petals. The masses of reeds were beyond a question the lurking-places of many crocodiles.
Blockley’s people had been at the place several times before, and at their suggestion I fired off several shots to give the residents of Impalera notice of my arrival. Before long two men put off in a canoe and landed on our shore. The canoe was only the stem of a tree hollowed out with an axe; it was about ten feet long, fourteen inches wide, and ten inches deep. The men were tall and strongly built, and wore the primitive vesture of the Bantu family in the most graceful way I had ever seen, their dark brown skins being set off by their leather waistbands, to which one of them had attached three small and handsome skins, and the other some yards of calico, skilfully arranged before and behind, with the ends gathered round his loins.
On their undertaking to report my arrival to their chief, Makumba, I gave them each a knife. At the same time one of our party made them understand that Georosiana Maniniani (i.e. little George), the name given to Blockley to distinguish him from Westbeech (who, on account of his size, was known as Georosiana Umutunya, or great George), was waiting in the Leshumo valley, expecting a number of bearers to convey the king’s goods to Impalera; also that they were to take down some corn with them, for which Georosiana Maniniani would give them sipaga, talama, and sisipa (small beads, large beads, and strips of calico). All the time we were talking the two men were squatting down on the ground; but as soon as the Manansa servant had made them comprehend his instructions they rose, and saying “Autile intate” (we understand you, friend), proceeded to take leave of me, with the further remark “Camaya koshi” (we go, sir).
Next morning, in an early walk up the valley, I found a surprising variety of traces of animals; there were tracks of buffaloes, koodoos, waterbocks, duykerbocks, orbeki gazelles, jackals, leopards, and lions. I likewise observed a good many hyæna-tracks, and kept continually hearing baboons barking on the hills, being induced several times to send a stray shot among the bushes. Amongst the birds I noticed two kinds of francolins, the guinea-fowl, the scopus, three kinds of plovers, saddle-storks (Mycteria Senegalensis, Shaw), several varieties of ducks, a kind of plectropterus, some spurred geese, a darter, and a kind of cormorant (Phalacrocorax).
To me the scenery that was most attractive was just above the rapids, three miles from our encampment, and about six miles from the mouth of the river. Here it was quite possible to trace the connexion of the Chobe with the Zambesi. Natural channels, full of calm flowing water, opened into the vast expanse of reeds, and the stream spread itself out over the wide marshy region. The rapids themselves rushed through a multitude of rocks, of which some were bare, some covered with sand, some overgrown with sedge, some clothed with trees and brushwood. In one place where the water had worn itself a way between two of the rocky islands, I noticed some well-constructed fish-wheels very similar to those we use in Europe. Birds, especially swamp-birds, were very numerous, having taken up their quarters both on the rocks and on the shore. I was confirmed in my conviction that the river was very full of crocodiles; and at the rapids (which, by the way, I named the Blockley rapids) I noticed some water-lizards.
Our camp in the evening of the same day was visited by a party of seventeen Masupias. They were fine-looking men, with their hair tied up at the top of their heads in little tufts, and adorned with ornaments of great variety, bunches of the hair of gazelles or other small animals, pieces of coral, and strings of beads. They also wore bracelets, mostly of leather, occasionally of ivory. I bought everything that they had brought with them in the way of assegais, knives, kaffir-corn and beans, paying them in beads and calico. One of the men to whom I had given a knife on the previous day brought me a clay pitcher made by their women and full of butshuala (kaffir-corn beer); it was an offering on his part, I was given to understand, that established between us the relationship of “mulekow,” that is to say, I had henceforth the right to claim anything I liked in his house; it is a custom of the nation that sometimes results in much that is evil, as even the women of the household are included in the licence; and when a few days later I was in Impalera it seemed to excite a good deal of astonishment that I made no further use of my mulekow privilege than to ask for fish, beer, corn, and a few insignificant curiosities.
Through “August,” the Manansa servant who acted as interpreter, the visitors informed me that Makumba, the chief, was now on the farther side of the Zambesi elephant hunting; and, moreover, that he was not at liberty to receive me until an answer had been received from Sepopo authorizing my admission. They even declined on this account to take any present from myself to Makumba, and when I afterwards saw the chief, he entered fully into the particulars of the relations of his people with the monarch of the Marutse.
It was soon very evident that our guests had very little regard for the law of “meum and tuum,” and we had to keep a very sharp look-out upon their proceedings throughout their visit.
Next day I received more visits from the Masupias. They were continually asking the servants, who understood their Makololo dialect, whether Georosiani Maniniani had any Matabele people with him in the Leshumo valley, as they were forbidden to permit them to enter the kingdom, even though they might declare that they had the king’s pass, and had I myself insisted upon taking any Matabele attendants, it is quite certain that, like Stanley, I should have had to make my way by force.
By the Marutse and Mashonas the Matabele are held in just as much detestation as are the Mohammedan slave-dealers from the east coast by the natives of Central Africa. Although it is quite possible that with a party of Matabele servants I might have traversed the whole continent from south to north, any white man coming after me would have had to suffer for my exploit. Twice during the reign of Sekeletu on the central Zambesi the Matabele attempted to carry their incursions north of the river, but each time they failed. On the first occasion they crossed the rapids above the Victoria Falls, and got on to an island planted with manza by the Batokas, a people subject to Sekeletu, but the water rose and cut off their retreat, leaving them no means of subsistence except the roots of the manza; the result was that the whole of them died, for the roots, although wholesome enough when dried, are poisonous if they are eaten fresh. The second of the failures occurred to a party of Matabele that was conveyed down the river by a Masupia, who, having conducted them to an island, declared he was so weary that he must go away and fetch some of his people to help him. The Matabele, with a credulity quite unusual to them, allowed the man to depart, and soon found themselves in a trap. The man did not turn up any more. They had a hard time of it; they were quite unskilled in the art of spearing fish; they were afraid on account of the crocodiles to attempt to swim across the river; they could find nothing whatever to eat except the fruit of a few fan-palms, and in a short time their hunger became intense; they were reduced to the emergency of trying to sustain life by eating their leather sandals, which they cut up into pieces with their spears, and soaked; but most of them died, and the rest were easily overpowered by Sekeletu, who sent a few well-manned canoes from Linyanti and carried them off to the Barotse valley, the mother-country of the Marutse, who at that time were his subjects. During my second visit to the Marutse royal quarters I had the opportunity of seeing some of these Matabele, who had come to Sesheke to pay tribute. They still wore the well-known headdress of feathers, but seemed to have lost all the warlike spirit of the Zulus, and Sepopo told me that they had become first-rate husbandmen.