On November 11, 1853, he left Linyanti, and arrived at Loanda on May 31, 1854.  The first stages of the journey were to be by water, and Sekeletu accompanied him to the Chobe, where he was to embark.  They crossed five branches before reaching the main stream, a wide and deep river full of hippopotami.  “The chief lent me his own canoe, and as it was broader than usual I could turn about in it with ease.  I had three muskets for my people, and a rifle and double-barrelled shotgun for myself.  My ammunition was distributed through the luggage, that we might not be left without a supply.  Our chief hopes for food were in our guns.  I carried twenty pounds of beads worth forty shillings, a few biscuits, a few pounds of tea and sugar, and about twenty pounds of coffee.  One small tin canister, about fifteen inches square, was filled with spare shirts, trousers, and shoes, to be used when we reached civilized life, another of the same size was stored with medicines, a third with books, and a fourth with a magic lantern, which we found of much service.  The sextant and other instruments were carried apart.  A bag contained the clothes we expected to wear out in the journey, which, with a small tent just sufficient to sleep in, a sheepskin mantle as a blanket, and a horse rug as a bed, completed my equipment.  An array of baggage would have probably excited the cupidity of the tribes through whose country we wished to pass.”

The voyage up the Chobe, and the Zambesi after the junction of those rivers, was prosperous but slow, in consequence of stoppages opposite villages.  “My man Pitsane knew of the generous orders of Sekeletu, and was not disposed to allow them remain a dead letter.”  In the rapids, “the men leaped into the water without the least hesitation to save the canoes from being dashed against the obstructions or caught in eddies.  They must never be allowed to come broadside to the stream, for being flat-bottomed they would at once be capsized and everything in them lost.”  When free from fever he was delighted to note the numbers of birds, several of them unknown, which swarmed on the river and its banks, all carefully noted in his journal.  One extract must suffice here:  “Whenever we step on shore a species of plover, a plaguy sort of public-spirited individual, follows, flying overhead, and is most persevering in its attempts to give warning to all animals to flee from the approaching danger.”

But he was already weak with fever; was seized with giddiness whenever he looked up quickly, and, if he could not catch hold of some support, fell heavily—­a bad omen for his chance of passing through the unknown country ahead—­but his purpose never faltered for a moment.  On January 1, 1854, he was still on the river, but getting beyond Sekeletu’s territory and allies, to a region of dense forest, in the open glades of which dwelt the Balonda, a powerful tribe, whose relations with the Makololo were precarious.  Each was inclined to raid on the other since the Mambari