the headman of a
hamlet, where we rested at midday, at once kindled a fire, and put on the
cooking-pot to make porridge. Both men and women are to be distinguished
by greater roundness of feature than the other natives, and the custom of
knocking out the upper front teeth gives at once a distinctive character
to the face. Their colour attests the greater altitude of the country in
which many of them formerly lived. Some, however, are as dark as the
Bashubia and Barotse of the great valley to their west, in which stands
Sesheke, formerly the capital of the Balui, or Bashubia.

The assertion may seem strange, yet it is none the less true, that in all
the tribes we have visited we never saw a really black person. Different
shades of brown prevail, and often with a bright bronze tint, which no
painter, except Mr. Angus, seems able to catch. Those who inhabit
elevated, dry situations, and who are not obliged to work much in the
sun, are frequently of a light warm brown, "dark but comely." Darkness
of colour is probably partly caused by the sun, and partly by something
in the climate or soil which we do not yet know. We see something of the
same sort in trout and other fish which take their colour from the ponds
or streams in which they live. The members of our party were much less
embrowned by free exposure to the sun for years than Dr. Livingstone and
his family were by passing once from Kuruman to Cape Town, a journey
which occupied only a couple of months.

We encamped on the Kalomo, on the 1st of October, and found the weather
very much warmer than when we crossed this stream in August. At 3 p.m.
the thermometer, four feet from the ground, was 101 degrees in the shade;
the wet bulb only 61 degrees: a difference of 40 degrees. Yet,
notwithstanding this extreme dryness of the atmosphere, without a drop of
rain having fallen for months, and scarcely any dew, many of the shrubs
and trees were putting forth fresh leaves of various hues, while others
made a profuse display of lovely blossoms.

Two old and very savage buffaloes were shot for our companions on the 3rd
October. Our Volunteers may feel an interest in knowing that balls
sometimes have but little effect: one buffalo fell, on receiving a
Jacob's shell; it was hit again twice, and lost a large amount of blood;
and yet it sprang up, and charged a native, who, by great agility, had
just time to climb a tree, before the maddened beast struck it, battering-