ched three detachments of his men with thirteen brown cows to
Lechulatebe, thirteen white cows to Sekomi, and thirteen black cows to
Sechele, with a request to each to assist the white men to reach him.
Their policy, however, was to keep him out of view, and act as his
agents in purchasing with his ivory the goods he wanted. This is
thoroughly African; and that continent being without friths and arms
of the sea, the tribes in the centre have always been debarred from
European intercourse by its universal prevalence among all the people
around the coasts.

Before setting out on our third journey to Sebituane, it was necessary
to visit Kuruman; and Sechele, eager, for the sake of the commission
thereon, to get the ivory of that chief into his own hands, allowed all
the messengers to leave before our return. Sekomi, however, was more
than usually gracious, and even furnished us with a guide, but no one
knew the path beyond Nchokotsa which we intended to follow. When we
reached that point, we found that the main spring of the gun of another
of his men, who was well acquainted with the Bushmen, through whose
country we should pass, had opportunely broken. I never undertook
to mend a gun with greater zest than this; for, under promise of his
guidance, we went to the north instead of westward. All the other guides
were most liberally rewarded by Mr. Oswell.

We passed quickly over a hard country, which is perfectly flat. A little
soil lying on calcareous tufa, over a tract of several hundreds of
miles, supports a vegetation of fine sweet short grass, and mopane and
baobab trees. On several parts of this we found large salt-pans, one
of which, Ntwetwe, is fifteen miles broad and one hundred long. The
latitude might have been taken on its horizon as well as upon the sea.

Although these curious spots seem perfectly level, all those in this
direction have a gentle slope to the northeast: thither the rain-water,
which sometimes covers them, gently gravitates. This, it may be
recollected, is the direction of the Zouga. The salt dissolved in
the water has by this means all been transferred to one pan in that
direction, named Chuantsa; on it we see a cake of salt and lime an inch
and a half thick. All the others have an efflorescence of lime and one
of the nitrates only, and some are covered thickly with shells. These
shells are identical with those of the mollusca of Lake Ngami and the
Zouga. There are three varieties, spiral, uni