AUGUST 22D. This is the end of winter. The trees which line the banks
begin to bud and blossom, and there is some show of the influence
of the new sap, which will soon end in buds that push off the old foliage
by assuming a very bright orange color. This orange is so bright that
I mistook it for masses of yellow blossom. There is every variety of shade
in the leaves - yellow, purple, copper, liver-color, and even inky black.
Having got the loan of other canoes from Mpololo, and three oxen
as provision for the way, which made the number we had been presented with
in the Barotse valley amount to thirteen, we proceeded down the river
toward Sesheke, and were as much struck as formerly with the noble river.
The whole scenery is lovely, though the atmosphere is murky
in consequence of the continuance of the smoky tinge of winter.
This peculiar tinge of the atmosphere was observed every winter at Kolobeng,
but it was not so observable in Londa as in the south, though I had always
considered that it was owing to the extensive burnings of the grass,
in which hundreds of miles of pasturage are annually consumed.
As the quantity burned in the north is very much greater than in the south,
and the smoky tinge of winter was not observed, some other explanation
than these burnings must be sought for.
