Some Of The Older Men Objected
To Abandoning The Line Of Defense Afforded By The Rivers Chobe And Zambesi
Against Their Southern Enemies The Matebele.
The Makololo generally have
an aversion to the Barotse valley, on account of the fevers
which are annually engendered in it as the waters dry up.
They prefer it
only as a cattle station; for, though the herds are frequently thinned
by an epidemic disease (peripneumonia), they breed so fast that the losses
are soon made good. Wherever else the Makololo go, they always leave
a portion of their stock in the charge of herdsmen in that prolific valley.
Some of the younger men objected to removal, because the rankness of the grass
at the Barotse did not allow of their running fast, and because there
"it never becomes cool."
Sekeletu at last stood up, and, addressing me, said, "I am perfectly satisfied
as to the great advantages for trade of the path which you have opened,
and think that we ought to go to the Barotse, in order to make the way
from us to Loanda shorter; but with whom am I to live there?
If you were coming with us, I would remove to-morrow; but now you are going
to the white man's country to bring Ma Robert, and when you return
you will find me near to the spot on which you wish to dwell."
I had then no idea that any healthy spot existed in the country,
and thought only of a convenient central situation, adapted for intercourse
with the adjacent tribes and with the coast, such as that
near to the confluence of the Leeba and Leeambye.
The fever is certainly a drawback to this otherwise important
missionary field. The great humidity produced by heavy rains and inundations,
the exuberant vegetation caused by fervid heat in rich moist soil,
and the prodigious amount of decaying vegetable matter annually exposed
after the inundations to the rays of a torrid sun, with a flat surface
often covered by forest through which the winds can not pass, all combine
to render the climate far from salubrious for any portion of the human family.
But the fever, thus caused and rendered virulent, is almost the only disease
prevalent in it. There is no consumption or scrofula,
and but little insanity. Smallpox and measles visited the country
some thirty years ago and cut off many, but they have since made no return,
although the former has been almost constantly in one part or another
of the coast. Singularly enough, the people used inoculation
for this disease; and in one village, where they seem to have chosen
a malignant case from which to inoculate the rest, nearly the whole village
was cut off. I have seen but one case of hydrocephalus, a few of epilepsy,
none of cholera or cancer, and many diseases common in England
are here quite unknown. It is true that I suffered severely from fever,
but my experience can not be taken as a fair criterion in the matter.
Compelled to sleep on the damp ground month after month, exposed to
drenching showers, and getting the lower extremities wetted two or three times
every day, living on native food (with the exception of sugarless coffee,
during the journey to the north and the latter half of the return journey),
and that food the manioc roots and meal, which contain so much
uncombined starch that the eyes become affected (as in the case of animals
fed for experiment on pure gluten or starch), and being exposed during
many hours each day in comparative inaction to the direct rays of the sun,
the thermometer standing above 96 Deg.
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