These, With Plenty Of Fish In The River,
Its Branches And Lagoons, Wild Fruits And Water-Fowl,
Always Make The People Refer To The Barotse As The Land Of Plenty.
The Scene From The Ridge, On Looking Back, Was Beautiful.
One can not see
the western side of the valley in a cloudy day, such as that was
when
We visited the stockade, but we could see the great river glancing out
at different points, and fine large herds of cattle quietly grazing
on the green succulent herbage, among numbers of cattle-stations and villages
which are dotted over the landscape. Leches in hundreds fed securely
beside them, for they have learned only to keep out of bow-shot,
or two hundred yards. When guns come into a country the animals soon learn
their longer range, and begin to run at a distance of five hundred yards.
I imagined the slight elevation (Katongo) might be healthy, but was informed
that no part of this region is exempt from fever. When the waters begin
to retire from this valley, such masses of decayed vegetation and mud
are exposed to the torrid sun that even the natives suffer severely
from attacks of fever. The grass is so rank in its growth that one
can not see the black alluvial soil of the bottom of this periodical lake.
Even when the grass falls down in winter, or is "laid" by its own weight,
one is obliged to lift the feet so high, to avoid being tripped up by it,
as to make walking excessively fatiguing.
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