Seven Years in South Africa/Volume 2/Chapter 5
CHAPTER V.
FROM TAMASETZE TO THE CHOBE
Leaving our encampment in the Tamasetze wood early on the morning of July 20th, we proceeded northwards across the grassy hollow. In the afternoon we were overtaken by a Dutch boy on horseback, very miserably clad. He was not more than fourteen years of age, and in reply to my question whither he was going, he told me that his father, who lived in a hut near the next pool, had sent him to take a waggon, and two negroes to attend to it, all the way to the Makalaka country, to barter beadsand calico for kaffir-corn.
We arrived next day at the pool of which the lad had spoken. It was called Henry’s Pan, after the name of a hunter’s servant who had killed a giraffe there. I found three Boer families settled at the place, as well as three Dutch hunters, Schmitt and the two brothers Lotriet. For the last month Schmitt had been living in a grass-hut, and had killed a sword-antelope on the day before our arrival. His narratives of hunting-excursions. were most interesting.
One of the Henry’s Pan people had a cancer in his lower jaw, and both the Lotriet families—one a party of three, and the other of nine—were suffering from fever. Their huts, wretched structures of dry branches and grass, were quite inadequate to protect them either from sun or rain, and as they lay upon the ground, their condition seemed pitiable in the extreme. They attributed all their hardships to a trader who had unscrupulously enticed them into the district, and wiped his hands of them almost directly afterwards. The account they gave was entirely substantiated by six hunters of whom I subsequently made inquiries; and so convinced was I that the facts ought to be circulated as a warning to others, that I sent the story of the Lotriets to the Diamond News, in which it was inserted under the title of “Dark Deeds.” I am in possession of other narratives of a similar character, which I am reserving for future publication.
So violent had been the fever that one or two of the Lotriets were really dangerously ill, the condition of the whole family being seriously aggravated by the want of clothing and proper medicines. I supplied them with what covering I could, and prescribed for their malady, in return receiving from them a tusk weighing nearly eight pounds, about equivalent in value to the quinine which I had given. Three days previously they had had to part with quite as much ivory for about six ounces of castor-oil.
I made an excursion in which I had the opportunity of getting very near to some koodoo-antelopes, but unfortunately I lost my way in the forest, and did not get back until it was quite late.
In another ramble I came upon a number of holes that had been dug out by elephants, most of them being more than a foot deep, some as much as eighteen inches. Having scented out their favourite roots and tubers, they go down on their knees and use their tusks to make the excavations, and as the soil is often very stony, and the slopes full of rock, the tusks are apt to get very much worn. Sometimes the result of the attrition is so considerable that a differenee of four pounds is caused in their weight.
We left Henry’s Pan on the 26th. Water again failed us on our route, and we were obliged to resume a system of forced marches. For some days our road lay through a very monotonous sandy forest. The trees were not generally remarkable, but we noticed one giant baobab, that just above the ground had a circumference of twenty-eight feet ten inches. The variety of birds was very great; birds of prey were represented by the buzzard and the dwarf owl; singing birds by pyrols of two kinds and fly-catchers, the males distinguished by their long tails; the smaller songsters being even more numerous than in places where the vegetation was more luxuriant and diversified. Shrikes were especially numerous, particularly a large kind with a red throat and breast, frequenting low thick bushes. Yellow-beaked hornbills were not uncommon, neither were small-tailed widow-birds, hoopoes, and bee-eaters. I likewise contrived to collect a good many plants, and some varieties of seeds, fruits, and funguses.
A wooded ascent brought us to a plain of tall grass, enclosed on two sides by the forest. Every-thing about us, animal and vegetable, seemed more and more to partake of a tropical character. I was much struck by the peculiar way in which some of the lezuminous trees shed their seeds, the heat of the sun causing the pods to burst with a loud explosion, and to cast the seed to a considerable distance all about. The air was full of myriads of tiny bees, that crept into our clothes, hair, and ears, and made our noses tingle to our great discomfort.
Since leaving the Nata we had been making a continuous ascent, and it seemed that we had now reached the highest point of the plateau. Some of the low hills that we passed contained traces of melaphyr and quartzite; and the soil generally was so stony, that although the baobab throve very fairly, all other trees and shrubs were of singularly stunted growth.
It was on the evening of the 30th that we had the satisfaction of resting our eyes upon the first affluent of the Zambesi, the Deykah. It was nothing more than a little brook, rising close to the spot where we encamped; but it contained some pools of which the water was deep enough to invite us to a bath, had we not been deterred by a prudent consideration of the crocodiles that were said to lurk there. In the adjacent glades the grass had been burnt down; indeed, there were some places where bushes were still smouldering, the fire having unquestionably been kindled by the ostrich-hunters, according to their wont.
The best part of the next day was taken up in crossing a number of valleys the drainage of which flowed into the Deykah, and in going over the intervening hills, some of which were rocky, and others equally sandy; but before daylight failed us we reached the valley of the Panda ma Tenka, a small river, that after flowing first north and then north-west, and taking up various spruits on its way, finally jos the Zambesi below the Victoria Falls. Since the English traders have opened traffic with the natives the place has been a kind of rendezvous alike for them and for the elephant-hunters, and we found several waggons quartered on the left bank. A depot, consisting of an enclosed courtyard containing a hut and a square magazine, has been built on the spot by Mr. Westbeech, the Zambesi merchant, who resides there himself during a certain portion of the year, and during his absence leaves his business to be transacted by his agents Blockley and Bradshaw. After he has disposed of his ivory in the diamond-fields, he returns with fresh goods, and makes this his starting-point for his expeditions to Sesheke and along the Zambesi.
I found Mr. Blockley at the depôt. I also learnt that one of the waggons belonged to Mr. Anderson, who was very pleased to see me again. Noticing at once the great height of the fences round the enclosures, I was informed that the precaution was indispensable, because “lions ran about like dogs,” the roads everywhere being covered with their tracks.
I am inclined to divide the South African lions into three species; first, the common full-maned lion that is found in Barbary; secondly, the maneless lion; and thirdly, the kind called “krachtmanetye” by the Dutch, distinguished by its short light hair, and by a mane that never reaches below the shoulder. I do not consider the “bondpoote” of the Dutch to be a distinct species, inasmuch as its dark spots are a characteristic of the full-maned lion, and disappear as it advances in age.
The full-maned lions of the northern part of the continent are very rarely to be seen in South Africa. The maneless lions used to be common on the Molapo, and are still to be found in the valley of the central Zambesi and on the lower Chobe, their colour being extremely light; but the most common are those of the short-maned species. They haunt the valley of the Limpopo from the mouth of the Notuany downwards, to the exclusion for the most part of every other kind. It is said that they are especially dangerous between the ages of two and four years.
Ordinarily the South African lion is a most cautious beast. It might almost be supposed that he calculates the chances of every conflict, very rarely returning to any encounter in which he has once been worsted. His usual tactics are to try to intimidate before he attacks; he will either approach with a tremendous roar, or advance with head erect gnashing his teeth; or sometimes he will dash along in a succession of long bounds; or again he will trot up briskly, uttering savage growls. But whichever mode of aggression he may choose, he never fails to keep his eye steadily fixed upon his intended victim. A perfect immovability is the best defence. The least sign of quailing is fatal; and the smallest movement will often infuriate a lion, especially a young lion, and invite an immediate attack. Cases are not unknown, but are comparatively rare, and generally confined to old and experienced lions, when they make their assaults without any of the preliminary devices that I have mentioned. Perhaps most of the instances of this kind would be when the beasts are absolutely suffering from hunger, or when they are exasperated after a chase, or when a lioness is guarding her whelps. It is of great advantage to a hunter, particularly to a novice in the pursuit, to see a lion before the lion sees him, even though it be for ever so short an interval. The most experienced hunter is only too likely to lose his composure if one of the giants of the forest is found face to face with him before he has time to prepare his weapon. No more unfortunate plight can be imagined, than that of a naturalist or a botanist engrossed in his studies, and suddenly disturbed by the growl of a lion close beside him. Natives seated round their fire may perhaps hope to escape, but for the solitary individual in the depths of the wood, there can be no reprieve.
In districts where they are much hunted, and where they have consequently become familiar with the sound of fire-arms, as well as in parts where there is hardly any game of the kind for which they care, lions are much more dangerous than in places where their food is plentiful, and where human
NOCTURNAL ATTACK BY LION.
footsteps rarely penetrate. Most notorious for their audacity are those which haunt the banks of the Maressana and Setlagole rivers, and those that are found in the Matabele country. Except perhaps the fox, no animal surpasses them in the craftiness with which they set themselves to secure their prey. Sometimes a group of them institutes a sort of battue. A few of them creep up and exhibit themselves to the victims they want to catch, thus scaring them back into the very clutch of the main body that lurks behind ready to receive them. Instinct prompts them to adopt this line of proceeding with animals whose speed is too rapid for them to overtake in open pursuit, and with such as are tall and can overlook their movements in the long grass. Horses, zebras, and giraffes, and any animals with solid hoofs form the favourite prey of all lions.
On the day after my arrival at Panda ma Tenka, Blockley invited Anderson and me to sup with him on buffalo-meat and pickled cod, prepared in London by Morton and Co. He told me that Mr. Westbeech had heard of my arrival from Mr. Mackenzie nine months ago, and that he had reported it to King Sepopo, who had willingly granted me permission to pay him a visit, adding that he was pleased to understand that I did not intend injuring his elephants. He said, moreover, that I should be in every way as welcome as Monari—that being the name by which Dr. Livingstone was known in the Marutse district. Blockley had himself spent several months at the royal residence, and had also, at the king’s invitation, once gone out to the relief of Westbeech, having taken a waggon with the greatest difficulty as far as the Barotse valley. I subsequently travelled with him, and much enjoyed his genial company.
During our stay here, I fell in with a number of Bakuenas, under the conduct of one of their princes, on their way to take Sepopo an old mare as a present from Sechele. They recognized me immediately, but I had not retained any recollection of them.
It happened that Blockley was on the point of starting to visit Sepopo, and I proposed to accompany him. I made arrangements for Theunissen to stay behind in charge of the waggon, gave stringent directions to Meriko to look after the bullocks, and decided to take Pit with me. At this time bullocks were fetching a good price; and I disposed of three of mine, because I found it requisite to get some ivory to replace my stock of ready money, that was all but exhausted. I likewise sold one of my breechloaders to Mr. Blockley, and spent the proceeds in replenishing our supply of tea, sugar, coffee, and other articles of regular consumption. Mr. Westbeech had commenced doing business with Sepopo four years back, and it was through his influence with the king that the Marutse domains had been thrown open to other merchants. He had the advantage of being able to speak with perfect fluency the three native languages—the Sesuto, the Setebele, and the Sechuana.
We started on the 3rd of August. Blockley took a whole waggonful of wares, which he hoped the king would purchase. The vehicle would be left about nine miles from the mouth of the Chobe, and the goods carried by bearers to the Zambesi, along which they would be conveyed in boats to the new residence of the Marutse-Mabunda sovereign.
For the first few miles our road lay along some interesting hill country, intersected by a number of spruits flowing east and north-east into the Panda ma Tenka; the higher parts were rocky, and generally covered with trees. Overhanging one of the streams was an immense baobab, close to which was said to be the resort of a lion, a dark-maned brute, which had sorely harassed the neighbourhood by its depredations.
In the evening we halted facing a wooded ridge, which would have to be crossed at night, on account of the tsetse-fly with which it was infested. We here met a half-caste, named “Africa,” who had been hunting ostriches twenty miles further on, and who was on his way to Panda ma Tenka, for the purpose of making some purchases of Blockley. Blockley accordingly had to return with him, but he gave his people instructions to proceed on their way for about thirty miles more, and then to wait for him to overtake them again. Africa had seen some of Sepopo’s people on the Chobe, and they had informed him that the king had been very much annoyed by the bad behaviour in his house of the Bakuena prince who had been sent with Sechele’s present.
Several times we heard the roaring of a lion, and so near to us did it seem at the time of our halting, that we not only made up unusually large fires, but took care to keep our guns ready for immediate service. The night was dark, and we could scarcely see ten yards in front of us, but shortly after two o’clock we ventured to start, and got safely through the wood without any inconvenience from the tsetse-fly, finding ourselves at dawn on the plain called the Gashuma Flat. It contained a good many pools, most of them moderately deep, frequented by water-birds. Altogether I have now crossed this plain three times, and never without noticing an abundance of game, but this time I saw zebras, Zulu-hartebeests, and harrisbocks, and, what I had never seen before, an orbeki gazelle. Continuing our journey, we came after a while to another plain, of which, like the last, the soil is so rich as to be quite impassable in the rainy season. Our next halt was near a wood, at a rain-pool called Saddler’s Pan.
After altering our course from north to north-west we came in the course of the following day to a dried up vain-pool, with a number of fan-palms adorning its banks. Westbeech subsequently told me that many most elegant trees of this kind had been felled by hunters and traders on the Gashuma Flat out of pure wantonness.
That evening we reached Schneeman’s Pan,a rain-pool at which Blockley had appointed that we should wait for him. I amused myself by making some inquiries about the Manansas who were in the place, ascertaining some particulars about their manners and customs, and picking up a few fragments of their language. Most of my information was obtained from one of them who had been taken south by a trader, and who had now hired himself to a farmer here, where he had taken the opportunity of learning Dutch, and by his help I made a list of 305 words and phrases in the dialect of the Manansas or Manandshas. The hunters nickname them Mashapatan.
One day after partaking of some round red-shelled beans I had some very decided symptoms of colic, and discovered that the colouring matter in the shells was injurious, and that the first water in which they were boiled ought to be thrown away; it was always quite violet. The natives, as I afterwards learnt, are particular to observe this precaution.
During our stay some of the Manansas brought us a lot of suet, which they wanted us to buy. When | ||
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Blockley, with two servants, returned in good time on the 8th, and we lost no time in proceeding on our way, in order to get through another district of the tsetse-wood during the night. In due time we reached the upper Leshumo valley, a narrow strip of land bordered by sandy heights, in which the waggon was to be left behind; the oxen were taken out, and were driven back to Schneeman’s Pan as quickly as possible, so as to be clear of the troublesome insects before daybreak.
A messenger was hence despatched to Impalera, a village on the other side of the Chobe, requesting Makumba, the chief of the Masupias, a subject tribe to the Marutse, to send a sufficient number of bearers to carry the merchandise to the Zambesi. Meanwhile we went a little way down the valley, which we found both marshy and rocky, with a number of springbocks continually darting out of the grass in one spot, to take refuge in another lower down.
On a slope which we reached in the course of the next hour, we noticed an immense number of elephant tracks, showing beyond a doubt that an enormous herd had passed that way during the previous night. The separate footprints were not more than an inch deep in the sand, but they extended over an area twenty yards or more wide. From the profusion of stems, boughs, and bushes with which the ground was littered, it was evident that they had rushed along with furious impetuosity; the stems in some instances were as thick as my arm, and trees of double the size had been snapped off, except as far as they were kept from falling by a strip of bark; several of the larger trunks had been broken off with such violence, that the remaining stump was left cleft open to the very root; many of the branches, too, had been torn away with tremendous force, and long shreds of the ragged bark hung waving in the air.
Some fine mimosas afforded a delicious shade, their crowns being too leafy for the sunshine to penetrate; and as we left the depression in which they were growing, we found that the soil became more and more level, till all at once it suddenly sloped down again into the valleys of the Chobe and the Zambesi.
Here was the realization of the vision of my youth! Here I was actually gazing on the stream that had mingled itself with my boyish dreams! Never shall I forget the panorama that then broke upon my view, nor the emotion with which I gazed on the valley beneath me.
It took me a few minutes to collect my thoughts. The valley in front stretched away three miles to the right, being bounded on the left by a plain that seemed absolutely unlimited. On the side on which I stood it was overhung by wooded rocks. In the middle of it were two islands, formed by the imperfect  | ||
| VOL. II. | ELEPHANTS ON THE MARCH. | Page 108. |
In front of Impalera, and about four miles from me, the Chobe was gleaming beautifully. It was there about 300 yards wide, and bordered with reeds.
The hills on the island are detached portions of the long ridge that makes the rocks and rapids of the Chobe, and which runs along further north so as again to form the rocks and rapids of the Zambesi on a larger scale, whence it is continued till finally it joins the rocky declivity of the plateau beyond the river at the Victoria Falls.
Towards the west the valley was bounded only by the blue line of the horizon.
I gazed long with the intensest interest. There—yes, there, only just beyond that single expanse of reed-thickets—there, lighted up by the rich and gorgeous red of the setting sun—there was the land which from my early childhood it had been my ambition to explore!