We Knew The General Direction We Ought To Follow,
And Also If Any Deviation Occurred From Our Proper Route;
But,
To avoid impassable forests and untreadable bogs, and to get to
the proper fords of the rivers, we always tried
To procure a guide,
and he always followed the common path from one village to another
when that lay in the direction we were going.
After leaving Cabango on the 21st, we crossed several little streams
running into the Chihombo on our left, and in one of them
I saw tree ferns (`Cyathea dregei') for the first time in Africa.
The trunk was about four feet high and ten inches in diameter.
We saw also grass trees of two varieties, which, in damp localities,
had attained a height of forty feet. On crossing the Chihombo, which we did
about twelve miles above Cabango, we found it waist-deep and rapid.
We were delighted to see the evidences of buffalo and hippopotami
on its banks. As soon as we got away from the track of the slave-traders,
the more kindly spirit of the southern Balonda appeared,
for an old man brought a large present of food from one of the villages,
and volunteered to go as guide himself. The people, however,
of the numerous villages which we passed always made efforts to detain us,
that they might have a little trade in the way of furnishing our suppers.
At one village, indeed, they would not show us the path at all
unless we remained at least a day with them.
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