There Are Hills On Both Sides Of The Lake, But The Haze
From Burning Grass Prevented Us At The Time From Seeing Far.
A long
time after our return from Nyassa, we received a letter from Captain
R. B. Oldfield, R.N.
, Then commanding H.M.S. "Lyra," with the
information that Dr. Roscher, an enterprising German who
unfortunately lost his life in his zeal for exploration, had also
reached the Lake, but on the 19th November following our discovery;
and on his arrival had been informed by the natives that a party of
white men were at the southern extremity. On comparing dates (16th
September and 19th November) we were about two months before Dr.
Roscher.
It is not known where Dr. Roscher first saw its waters; as the exact
position of Nusseewa on the borders of the Lake, where he lived some
time, is unknown. He was three days north-east of Nusseewa, and on
the Arab road back to the usual crossing-place of the Rovuma, when he
was murdered. The murderers were seized by one of the chiefs, sent
to Zanzibar, and executed. He is said to have kept his discoveries
to himself, with the intention of publishing in Europe the whole at
once, in a splendid book of travels.
The chief of the village near the confluence of the Lake and River
Shire, an old man, called Mosauka, hearing that we were sitting under
a tree, came and kindly invited us to his village. He took us to a
magnificent banyan-tree, of which he seemed proud. The roots had
been trained down to the ground into the form of a gigantic arm-
chair, without the seat. Four of us slept in the space betwixt its
arms. Mosauka brought us a present of a goat and basket of meal "to
comfort our hearts." He told us that a large slave party, led by
Arabs, were encamped close by. They had been up to Cazembe's country
the past year, and were on their way back, with plenty of slaves,
ivory, and malachite. In a few minutes half a dozen of the leaders
came over to see us. They were armed with long muskets, and, to our
mind, were a villanous-looking lot. They evidently thought the same
of us, for they offered several young children for sale, but, when
told that we were English, showed signs of fear, and decamped during
the night. On our return to the Kongone, we found that H.M.S. "Lynx"
had caught some of these very slaves in a dhow; for a woman told us
she first saw us at Mosauka's, and that the Arabs had fled for fear
of an UNCANNY sort of Basungu.
This is one of the great slave-paths from the interior, others cross
the Shire a little below, and some on the lake itself. We might have
released these slaves but did not know what to do with them
afterwards. On meeting men, led in slave-sticks, the Doctor had to
bear the reproaches of the Makololo, who never slave, "Ay, you call
us bad, but are we yellow-hearted, like these fellows - why won't you
let us choke them?" To liberate and leave them, would have done but
little good, as the people of the surrounding villages would soon
have seized them, and have sold them again into slavery.
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