t. We
outspanned that night at a distance of twelve good miles north-east of
Gwanda, in a most beautiful valley full of lush grass, and beside the
stream, now much diminished in volume, which we had been following ever
since our passage of the Limpopo; and, I having shot an elephant about
an hour before our arrival at the outspan, we all feasted royally that
night, the impi building an enormous watch fire and squatting round it,
stuffing themselves with elephant meat until they could eat no more.

Early in the forenoon of the eleventh day after our departure from
Gwanda we reached the Zambezi, at a point where, by a stroke of good
luck, the river chanced to be fordable; and, having got the wagon and
all my other belongings safely across to the left bank, I immediately
outspanned, and then proceeded to distribute liberal largesse among the
subordinate officers of the impi, gave Mapela a specially handsome
present, and so parted upon excellent terms from my Mashona friends, not
without a qualm of regret and of wistful surmise as to my chances of
ever again seeing them. Later on, after a meal and a rest, we again
inspanned, and, trekking a few miles upstream, rounded the shoulder of a
range of low hills and plunged into a valley stretching northward, with
a small southward-flowing stream running through its centre and
discharging into the Zambezi, upon which splendid river we now turned
our backs. 'Mfuni, the man who had fought me by command of Lomalindela,
and had afterwards attached himself to my train, exhibited some slight
symptoms of regret at parting from his friends in the returning impi;
but he quickly recovered from his fit of the blues, and, evidently being
very fond of animals, devoted himself with zest to the task of making
friends with the horses and dogs. Also the poor fellow speedily
developed a most devoted attachment to myself, so arousing in Piet a
feeling of profound jealousy and disgust which I only succeeded in
dissipating with difficulty after the occurrence of several more or less
serious quarrels between the pair.

During the three weeks that immediately followed our passage of the
Zambezi, our route lay through a wilderness in which for days together
we never saw a solitary human being. But this did not very greatly
matter, for the country, consisting for the most part of low, rolling
hills, was well watered by streams which, flowing generally in a
direction more or less north and south, we w