carefully onwards by main force until it properly covers the two enclosures. The ends of the reeds have then to be clipped off even all round the top of the verandah, after which the entire roof is covered with a layer of last year’s grass five or six inches thick, and bound over with a perfect network of palmcord to make it firm against the wind. Great pains are bestowed upon getting a smooth surface to the cement, particularly where it is laid over the cornice of the inner doorway, which not unfrequently is very delicately moulded. I was told that the former royal residence in the Barotse valley had been very prettily built.
Of the kind of houses that I have been describing the king has three for his own use; they are surrounded by an oval fence, and form the centre of several circles of homesteads, the nearest circle containing eight residences for the queens, built in the Masupia style like ovens, and accommodating two or three ladies apiece; beyond these are placed the storehouse, the culinary offices, and the huts for the royal musicians; the fourth and outer circle consisting of the huts for all the servants of both sexes, and containing likewise the council-hall, which is fitted up very much in European fashion. Ordinarily the chiefs would have their abodes in a wide circle outside the court, but here in New Sesheke, where the royal buildings are bounded on one side by the river, the dwellings are arranged in a semi-circle, the ground assigned to each being very accurately marked out. For protection against wild beasts the entrance to the king’s courtyard is closed every night by a strong palisade of reeds.
The second kind of huts, which I have specified
