It Lies Two Thousand Feet Above The Level Of The Sea,
And As Much Below The Southern Border Of The Kalahari, Which Slopes Gradually
Toward The Interior.
Their desire to visit Sebituane, whose residence was considerably farther
in the interior, was frustrated by the jealousy of Lechulatebe,
a chief near the lake, and the expedition returned to the station at Kolobeng.
The attempt was renewed the following year.
Mrs. Livingstone,
their three children, and Sechele accompanied him. The lake was reached.
Lechulatebe, propitiated by the present of a valuable gun, agreed to furnish
guides to Sebituane's country; but the children and servants fell ill,
and the attempt was for the time abandoned.
A third expedition was successful, although the whole party
came near perishing for want of water, and their cattle,
which had been bitten by the `Tsetse', died.
This insect - the `Glossina moritans' of the naturalists -
deserves a special paragraph. It is a brown insect about as large
as our common house-fly, with three or four yellow bars
across its hinder part. A lively, buzzing, harmless-looking fellow
is the tsetse. Its bite produces a slight itching similar to that
caused by the mosquito, and in the case of men and some species of animals
no further ill effects follow. But woe to the horse, the ox, and the dog,
when once bitten by the tsetse. No immediate harm appears;
the animal is not startled as by the gad-fly; but in a few days
the eyes and the nose begin to run; the jaws and navel swell;
the animal grazes for a while as usual, but grows emaciated and weak,
and dies, it may be, weeks or months after. When dissected,
the cellular tissue seems injected with air, the fat is green and oily,
the muscles are flabby, the heart is so soft that the finger
may be pushed through it. The antelope and buffalo, the zebra and goat,
are not affected by its bite; while to the ox, the horse, and the dog
it is certain death. The mule and donkey are not troubled by it,
nor are sucking calves, while dogs, though fed upon milk, perish.
Such different effects produced upon animals whose nature is similar,
constitute one of the most curious phenomena in natural history.
Sebituane, who had heard of the approach of his visitors,
came more than a hundred miles to meet them. He was a tall, wiry,
coffee-and-milk colored man, of five-and-forty. His original home
was a thousand miles to the south, in the Bakwain country,
whence he had been driven by the Griquas a quarter of a century before.
He fled northward, fighting his way, sometimes reduced to the utmost straits,
but still keeping his people together. At length he crossed the desert,
and conquered the country around Lake Ngami; then having heard of white men
living on the west coast, he passed southwestward into the desert,
hoping to be able to open intercourse with them. There suffering
from the thirst, he came to a small well; the water was not sufficient
for his men and his cattle; one or the other must perish; he ordered the men
to drink, for if they survived they could fight for more cattle.
In the morning his cattle were all gone, and he returned to the north.
Here a long course of warfare awaited him, but in the end
he triumphed over his enemies, and established himself for a time
on the great river Zambesi.
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