etween the Kafue and Loangwa have their sides of
the form seen in mud banks left by the tide. The pot-holes appear
most abundant on low gray sandstone ridges here; and as the shingle is
composed of the same rocks as the hills west of Zumbo, it looks as if
a current had dashed along from the southeast in the line in which the
pot-holes now appear; and if the current was deflected by those hills
toward the Maravi country, north of Tete, it may have hollowed the
rounded, water-worn caverns in which these people store their corn, and
also hide themselves from their enemies. I could detect no terraces on
the land, but, if I am right in my supposition, the form of this part of
the continent must once have resembled the curves or indentations seen
on the southern extremity of the American continent. In the indentation
to the S.E., S., S.W., and W. of this, lie the principal gold-washings;
and the line of the current, supposing it to have struck against the
hills of Mburuma, shows the washings in the N. and N.E. of Tete.

We were tolerably successful in avoiding the villages, and slept one
night on the flanks of the hill Zimika, where a great number of deep
pot-holes afforded an abundant supply of good rain-water. Here, for the
first time, we saw hills with bare, smooth, rocky tops, and we crossed
over broad dikes of gneiss and syenitic porphyry: the directions in
which they lay were N. and S. As we were now near to Tete, we were
congratulating ourselves on having avoided those who would only have
plagued us; but next morning some men saw us, and ran off to inform the
neighboring villages of our passing. A party immediately pursued us,
and, as they knew we were within call of Katolosa (Monomotapa), they
threatened to send information to that chief of our offense, in passing
through the country without leave. We were obliged to give them two
small tusks; for, had they told Katolosa of our supposed offense, we
should, in all probability, have lost the whole. We then went through a
very rough, stony country without any path. Being pretty well tired
out in the evening of the 2d of March, I remained at about eight miles
distance from Tete, Tette, or Nyungwe. My men asked me to go on; I felt
too fatigued to proceed, but sent forward to the commandant the letters
of recommendation with which I had been favored in Angola by the bishop
and others, and lay down to rest. Our food having been exhausted, my men
had been subsisting for some t