About Zimbabwe we found the natives playing a sort of Jew’s harp, made out of a reed and string, giving forth a very faint and ineffective sound. Also they have their cymbals and their drums, which latter they play with elbow and fist in a most energetic manner. Anything, in fact, which makes a noise is pleasing to them. At their dances they tie to their persons small reeds or gourds filled with the seed of the Indian shot, which rattle and add to the prevailing din. They are for ever singing the low, monotonous songs common to primitive races; they encourage one another with song when at work in the fields, or when out on a hunting expedition, and dearly did they love some small musical boxes which we had with us. Music is certainly inherent in them, and one of our men was quite quick at picking up an air, and very angry if his comrades sang out of time or tune.
When time permitted we made several little excursions in the neighbourhood of Zimbabwe. One of these led us to the ruins which they call Little Zimbabwe, about eight miles off. Of all these ruins they have next to no legends, which surprised us greatly. One story, however, they tell, which appears to have obtained universal credence amongst them—that long, long ago white men came and erected these buildings, but the black men poisoned the water and they all died. This story seems to [[83]]have about as much value in it as the one told us by De Barros, that the natives of his day thought that they had been built by the Devil.
About two miles from our camp there was a long flat granite rock, along which the path passed. On either side of this are two piles of stones, and a line is scratched on the rock between them. Our guides each took a stone, scratched them along the line, and deposited them on the heap opposite. On returning in the evening they did exactly the same thing, and we were told that it is a luck sign, which they do on undertaking a journey to ensure them from danger by the way. It was a very lovely ride, past huge granite boulders, and hills covered with dense foliage, beneath which the women of a village danced for us to the tune of their drum, forming one of the wildest, weirdest pictures we had ever seen. On another occasion we rode to a fortified rock, which had been long since abandoned; but the rude stone walls had been constructed by a more recent race, and compared with certain ruined villages we afterwards saw in Mangwendi’s country.[2] On our homeward ride we turned aside to rest in a hut where we found natives busily employed in making beer, a process which they always carry out in the fields, where they have their stores, and in cooking locusts, which we tasted and thought not altogether unlike shrimps.
Thus our time passed at Zimbabwe, actively and pleasantly, and when our second month of work was [[84]]up, as we had much travelling before us in the country, we reluctantly decided on departure.
We went up to take leave of the induna Ikomo at his kraal on the day before our departure. He was seated in front of his hut, eating his red-coloured sodza, made of millet meal, and locusts, allowing his head men, who sat around, to take occasional handfuls from his savoury platter. Conversation turned on his tribe. He told us how they had come to Zimbabwe about forty years ago, when he was only eighteen years of age, from the neighbourhood of the Sabi River, where they had lived for many years. No one was then living on Zimbabwe Hill, which was covered, as it is still in parts, with a dense jungle. No one knew anything about the ruins, neither did they seem to care. This is how all tradition is lost among them. The migratory spirit of the people entirely precludes them from having any information of value to give concerning the place in which they may be located; they seldom remain more than one generation in one place, and one place is to them only different from another inasmuch as it affords them refuge from the Matabele and has soil around it which will produce their scanty crops.
On leaving Zimbabwe and our work, we determined on making a tentative trip of a few days, with horses and a donkey, to see how we could manage travelling in the wilds in this country without our waggon home. Moreover, we wished to pay a visit [[85]]to Umgabe at his kraal, and to take his rival, Cherumbila, on the way back to Fort Victoria.
One lovely morning—the 6th of August—we left our waggons, our cook, and our curios to find their way to Fort Victoria by themselves, and set off. The scenery southwards down the gorge was charming, granite kopje after granite kopje carrying the eye far away into the blue hazy distance. The foliage was thick and shady, and as we halted at a stream to water our animals we plucked large fronds of Osmunda regalis and the tree fern. To our left we passed a huge split rock, just a square block of granite eighty feet high split into four parts, so that narrow paths lead from each side into the heart of it. It was one of the most extraordinary natural stone formations I have ever seen, and the natives call it Lumbo. A relation of Umgabe’s rules over a fantastic kraal, called Baramazimba, hard by this rock; its huts are situated in such inaccessible corners that you wonder how the inhabitants ever get to them. Huge trees sheltered the entrance to this village, beneath which men were seated on the ground playing isafuba, the mysterious game of the Makalangas, with sixty holes in rows in the ground. Ten men can play at this game, and it consists in removing bits of pottery or stones from one hole to the other in an unaccountable manner. We watched it scores of times whilst in the country, and always gave it up as a bad job, deciding that it must be like draughts or chess, learnt by them from the former civilised race who [[86]]dwelt here. This game is played in different places with different numbers of holes—sometimes only thirty-two holes dug in the ground—always in rows of four. It has a close family relationship to the game called pullangooly of India, played in a fish—the sisoo fish, made of wood—which opens like a chess-board, and has fourteen holes in two rows of seven, small beans being employed as counters. The same game hails also from Singapore and from the West Coast of Africa, where it is played with twelve holes and is called wary. In short, wherever Arabian influence has been felt this game in some form or other is always found, and forms for us another link in the chain of evidence connecting the Mashonaland ruins with an Arabian influence. The Makalangas are also far superior to other neighbouring Kaffir races in calculating, probably owing to the influence of this very game.
At midday we reached Umgabe’s kraal and found our host only just recovering from the effects of drinking too much beer, and he had a relapse in the course of the afternoon to celebrate our arrival. He allotted us two huts, which we proceeded to have cleaned out. My wife and I occupied one, delightfully situated beneath a spreading cork tree; it was about twelve feet in diameter, and in the centre was the fireplace of cement with a raised seat by it on which the cook usually sits when stirring the pot. We spread our rugs where it appeared most level; but during the night, in spite of our candle, the rats [[87]]careered about us to such an alarming extent that sleep was next to impossible, and we had ample time at our disposal for contemplating our abode.
On one side was a raised place for the family jars, huge earthenware things covered with slabs of stone, containing meal, caterpillars, locusts, and other edibles. On the opposite side was a stable for the calves, which we were able to banish; but we could not so easily control the cocks and hens which came in at all the holes, nor the rats which darted amongst the smoke-begrimed rafters when day dawned. These blackened rafters of the roof the Makalangas use as cupboards, sticking therein their pipes, their weapons, their medicine phials, their tools, and their pillows, and we soon found that this was the place to look for all manner of curios; only the huts are so dark that it is impossible to see anything when there happen to be no holes in the walls. A low door three feet high is the only point for admitting light and air; consequently the huts are not only dark but odoriferous. Besides the walls, the Makalangas construct a primitive sort of cupboard out of the spreading branch of a tree tied round with bark fibre; this contains such things as they fear the rats may spoil. They are very ingenious in making things out of bark—long narrow bags for meal, hen coops in which to carry their poultry about, nets to keep the roofs on their granaries. Bark to them is one of the most useful natural products that they have.
Umgabe’s kraal has as lovely a situation as can [[88]]well be imagined. It is situated in a glade, buried in trees and vegetation, so that until you are in it you hardly notice the spot. Huge granite mountains rise on either side, completely shutting it in; a rushing stream runs through the glade, supplying the place with delicious water. Here is distinctly a spot where only man is vile; and the great fat chief, seated on the top of a rock, sodden with beer, formed one of the vilest specimens of humanity I ever saw.