The Babies At The Breast Crowed To Us As We Passed,
Their Mothers Kneeling And Grubbing For The Roots; The
Poor little
things still drawing nourishment from the natural fountain were
unconscious of that sinking of heart which their parents
Must have
felt in knowing that the supply for the little ones must soon fail.
No one would sell a bit of food to us: fishermen, even, would not
part with the produce of their nets, except in exchange for some
other kind of food. Numbers of newly-made graves showed that many
had already perished, and hundreds were so emaciated that they had
the appearance of human skeletons swathed in brown and wrinkled
leather. In passing mile after mile, marked with these sad proofs
that "man's inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn," one
experiences an overpowering sense of helplessness to alleviate human
woe, and breathes a silent prayer to the Almighty to hasten the good
time coming when "man and man the world o'er, shall brothers be for
all that." One small redeeming consideration in all this misery
could not but be felt; these ills were inflicted by heathen Mazitu,
and not by, or for, those who say to Him who is higher than the
highest, "We believe that thou shalt come to be our Judge."
We crossed the Mokole, rested at Chitanda, and then left the Lake,
and struck away N.W. to Chinsamba's. Our companions, who were so
much oppressed by the rarefied air of the plateau, still showed signs
of exhaustion, though now only 1300 feet above the sea, and did not
recover flesh and spirits till we again entered the Lower Shire
Valley, which is of so small an altitude, that, without simultaneous
observations with the barometer there and on the sea-coast, the
difference would not be appreciable.
On a large plain on which we spent one night, we had the company of
eighty tobacco traders on their way from Kasungu to Chinsamba's. The
Mazitu had attacked and killed two of them, near the spot where the
Zulus fled from us without answering our questions. The traders were
now so frightened that, instead of making a straight course with us,
they set off by night to follow the shores of the Lake to Tsenga, and
then turn west. It is the sight of shields, or guns that inspires
terror. The bowmen feel perfectly helpless when the enemy comes with
even the small protection the skin shield affords, or attacks them in
the open field with guns. They may shoot a few arrows, but they are
such poor shots that ten to one if they hit. The only thing that
makes the arrow formidable is the poison; for if the poisoned barb
goes in nothing can save the wounded. A bow is in use in the lower
end of Lake Nyassa, but is more common in the Maravi country, from
six to eight inches broad, which is intended to be used as a shield
as well as a bow; but we never saw one with the mark on it of an
enemy's arrow.
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