beds at impossible places, screamed out their shrill war-alarm, and made the valley ring with their wild outcries.  It was war, and war alone, and we were too deep down in the valley to make our voices heard in explanation.  Fortunately, they had burned off the long grass to a great extent.  It only here and there hid them from us.  Selecting an open spot, we spent a night regarded by all around us as slave-hunters, but were undisturbed, though the usual way of treating an enemy in this part of the country is by night attack.

The nights at the altitude of the valley were cool, the lowest temperature shown being 37 degrees; at 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. it was 58 degrees, about the average temperature of the day; at mid-day 82 degrees, and sunset 70 degrees.  Our march was very much hindered by the imperfectly burned corn and grass stalks having fallen across the paths.  To a reader in England this will seem a very small obstacle.  But he must fancy the grass stems as thick as his little finger, and the corn-stalks like so many walkingsticks lying in one direction, and so supporting each other that one has to lift his feet up as when wading through deep high heather.  The stems of grass showed the causes of certain explosions as loud as pistols, which are heard when the annual fires come roaring over the land.  The heated air inside expanding bursts the stalk with a loud report, and strews the fragments on the ground.

A very great deal of native corn had been cultivated here, and we saw buffaloes feeding in the deserted gardens, and some women, who ran away very much faster than the beasts did.

On the 29th, seeing some people standing under a tree by a village, we sat down, and sent Masego, one of our party, to communicate.  The headman, Matunda, came back with him, bearing a calabash with water for us.  He said that all the people had fled from the Ajawa, who had only just desisted from their career of pillage on being paid five persons as a fine for some offence for which they had commenced the invasion.  Matunda had plenty of grain to sell, and all the women were soon at work grinding it into meal.  We secured an abundant supply, and four milk goats.  The Manganja goat is of a very superior breed to the general African animal, being short in the legs and having a finely-shaped broad body.  By promising the Makololo that, when we no longer needed the milk, they should have the goats to improve the breed of their own at home, they were induced to take the greatest possible care of both goats and kids in driving and pasturing.

After leaving Matunda, we came to the end of the highland valley; and, before descending a steep declivity of a thousand feet towards the part which may be called the heel of the Lake, we had the bold mountains of Cape Maclear on our right, with the blue water at their base, the hills of Tsenga in the distance in front, and Kirk’s Range on our left, stretching away northwards, and apparently becoming lower.  As we came down into a fine rich undulating valley, many perennial streams running to the east from the hills on our left were crossed, while all those behind us on the higher ground seemed to unite in one named Lekue, which flowed into the Lake.