Describes African Domesticity, and Many Other Things Relative Thereto, Besides Showing that Alarms and Flights, Surprises and Feasts, are not Confined to Particular Places.

When our negro chief—whose name, by the way, was Kambira—left the banks of the river, followed by his men bearing the hippopotamus-flesh, he set off at a swinging pace, like to a man who has a considerable walk before him.

The country through which they passed was not only well wooded, but well watered by numerous rivulets¹. Their path for some distance tended upwards³ towards the hills, now crossing over mounds⁴, anon skirting the base of precipitous rocks, and elsewhere dipping down into hollows; but although thus serpentine⁵ in its course, its upward tendency never varied⁶ until it led them to the highest parts of a ridge⁷ from which a magnificent prospect⁸ was had of hill and dale, lake, rivulet² and river, extending so far that the distant scenery at the horizon appeared of a thin pearly-grey colour, and of the same consistency⁹ as the clouds with which it mingled¹⁰.

Passing over this ridge, and descending¹² into a wide valley which was fertilised and beautified by a moderately-sized rivulet, Kambira led his followers¹³ towards a hamlet which lay close to the stream, nestled in a woody hollow, and, like all other Manganja villages, was surrounded by an impenetrable hedge of poisonous euphorbia—a tree which casts a deep shade, and renders it difficult for bowmen to aim at the people inside.

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