s of the Zambesi.
Looking southwards, the country is open plain and woodland, with detached
hills and mountains in the distance; but the latter are too far off, the
natives say, for them to know their names. The principal hills on our
right, as we look up stream, are from six to twelve miles away, and
occasionally they send down spurs to the river, with brooks flowing
through their narrow valleys. The banks of the Zambesi show two well-
defined terraces; the first, or lowest, being usually narrow, and of
great fertility, while the upper one is a dry grassy plain, a thorny
jungle, or a mopane (_Bauhinia_) forest. One of these plains, near the
Kafue, is covered with the large stumps and trunks of a petrified forest.
We halted a couple of days by the fine stream Sinjere, which comes from
the Chiroby-roby hills, about eight miles to the north. Many lumps of
coal, brought down by the rapid current, lie in its channel. The natives
never seem to have discovered that coal would burn, and, when informed of
the fact, shook their heads, smiled incredulously, and said "_Kodi_"
(really), evidently regarding it as a mere traveller's tale. They were
astounded to see it burning freely on our fire of wood. They told us
that plenty of it was seen among the hills; but, being long ago aware
that we were now in an immense coalfield, we did not care to examine it
further.

A dyke of black basaltic rock, called Kakolole, crosses the river near
the mouth of the Sinjere; but it has two open gateways in it of from
sixty to eighty yards in breadth, and the channel is very deep.

On a shallow sandbank, under the dyke, lay a herd of hippopotami in
fancied security. The young ones were playing with each other like young
puppies, climbing on the backs of their dams, trying to take hold of one
another by the jaws and tumbling over into the water. Mbia, one of the
Makololo, waded across to within a dozen yards of the drowsy beasts, and
shot the father of the herd; who, being very fat, soon floated, and was
secured at the village below. The headman of the village visited us
while we were at breakfast. He wore a black "ife" wig and a printed
shirt. After a short silence he said to Masakasa, "You are with the
white people, so why do you not tell them to give me a cloth?" "We are
strangers," answered Masakasa, "why do you not bring us some food?" He
took the plain hint, and brought us two fowls, in order that we should
not report that in pas