Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa by David Livingstone (interesting books to read for teens TXT) 📖

Both the Lekone and Unguesi flow back toward the centre of the country, and in an opposite direction to that of the main stream.

It was plain, then, that we were ascending the farther we went eastward.

The level of the lower portion of the Lekone is about two hundred feet above that of the Zambesi at the falls, and considerably more than the altitude of Linyanti; consequently, when the river flowed along this ancient bed instead of through the rent, the whole country between this and the ridge beyond Libebe westward, Lake Ngami and the Zouga southward, and eastward beyond Nchokotsa, was one large fresh-water lake.

There is abundant evidence of the existence and extent of this vast lake in the longitudes indicated, and stretching from 17 Deg. to 21 Deg.

south latitude. The whole of this space is paved with a bed of tufa, more or less soft, according as it is covered with soil, or left exposed to atmospheric influences. Wherever ant-eaters make deep holes in this ancient bottom, fresh-water shells are thrown out, identical with those now existing in the Lake Ngami and the Zambesi.

The Barotse valley was another lake of a similar nature; and one existed beyond Masiko, and a fourth near the Orange River.

The whole of these lakes were let out by means of cracks or fissures made in the subtending sides by the upheaval of the country.

The fissure made at the Victoria Falls let out the water of this great valley, and left a small patch in what was probably its deepest portion, and is now called Lake Ngami. The Falls of Gonye furnished an outlet to the lake of the Barotse valley, and so of the other great lakes of remote times. The Congo also finds its way to the sea through a narrow fissure, and so does the Orange River in the west; while other rents made in the eastern ridge, as the Victoria Falls and those to the east of Tanganyenka, allowed the central waters to drain eastward.

All the African lakes hitherto discovered are shallow, in consequence of being the mere `residua' of very much larger ancient bodies of water.

There can be no doubt that this continent was, in former times, very much more copiously supplied with water than at present, but a natural process of drainage has been going on for ages.

Deep fissures are made, probably by the elevation of the land, proofs of which are seen in modern shells imbedded in marly tufa all round the coast-line. Whether this process of desiccation is as rapid throughout the continent as, in a letter to the late Dean Buckland, in 1843, I showed to have been the case in the Bechuana country, it is not for me to say; but, though there is a slight tradition of the waters having burst through the low hills south of the Barotse, there is none of a sudden upheaval accompanied by an earthquake.

The formation of the crack of Mosioatunya is perhaps too ancient for that; yet, although information of any remarkable event is often transmitted in the native names, and they even retain a tradition which looks like the story of Solomon and the harlots, there is not a name like Tom Earthquake or Sam Shake-the-ground in the whole country.

They have a tradition which may refer to the building of the Tower of Babel, but it ends in the bold builders getting their crowns cracked by the fall of the scaffolding; and that they came out of a cave called "Loey" (Noe?) in company with the beasts, and all point to it in one direction, viz., the N.N.E. Loey, too, is an exception in the language, as they use masculine instead of neuter pronouns to it.

If we take a glance back at the great valley, the form the rivers have taken imparts the idea of a lake slowly drained out, for they have cut out for themselves beds exactly like what we may see in the soft mud of a shallow pool of rain-water, when that is let off by a furrow.

This idea would probably not strike a person on coming first into the country, but more extensive acquaintance with the river system certainly would convey the impression. None of the rivers in the valley of the Leeambye have slopes down to their beds. Indeed, many parts are much like the Thames at the Isle of Dogs, only the Leeambye has to rise twenty or thirty feet before it can overflow some of its meadows. The rivers have each a bed of low water -- a simple furrow cut sharply out of the calcareous tufa which lined the channel of the ancient lake -- and another of inundation.

When the beds of inundation are filled, they assume the appearance of chains of lakes. When the Clyde fills the holms ("haughs") above Bothwell Bridge and retires again into its channel, it resembles the river we are speaking of, only here there are no high lands sloping down toward the bed of inundation, for the greater part of the region is not elevated fifty feet above them. Even the rocky banks of the Leeambye below Gonye, and the ridges bounding the Barotse valley, are not more than two or three hundred feet in altitude over the general dead level. Many of the rivers are very tortuous in their course, the Chobe and Simah particularly so; and, if we may receive the testimony of the natives, they form what anatomists call `anastamosis', or a network of rivers. Thus, for instance, they assured me that if they go up the Simah in a canoe, they can enter the Chobe, and descend that river to the Leeambye; or they may go up the Kama and come down the Simah; and so in the case of the Kafue.

It is reputed to be connected in this way with the Leeambye in the north, and to part with the Loangwa; and the Makololo went from the one into the other in canoes. And even though the interlacing may not be quite to the extent believed by the natives, the country is so level and the rivers so tortuous that I see no improbability in the conclusion that here is a network of waters of a very peculiar nature.

The reason why I am disposed to place a certain amount of confidence in the native reports is this: when Mr. Oswell and I discovered the Zambesi in the centre of the continent in 1851, being unable to ascend it at the time ourselves, we employed the natives to draw a map embodying their ideas of that river. We then sent the native map home with the same view that I now mention their ideas of the river system, namely, in order to be an aid to others in farther investigations.

When I was able to ascend the Leeambye to 14 Deg. south, and subsequently descend it, I found, after all the care I could bestow, that the alterations I was able to make in the original native plan were very trifling. The general idea their map gave was wonderfully accurate; and now I give, in the larger map appended, their views of the other rivers, in the hope that they may prove helpful to any traveler who may pursue the investigation farther.

24TH. We remained a day at the village of Moyara. Here the valley in which the Lekone flows trends away to the eastward, while our course is more to the northeast. The country is rocky and rough, the soil being red sand, which is covered with beautiful green trees, yielding abundance of wild fruits. The father of Moyara was a powerful chief, but the son now sits among the ruins of the town, with four or five wives and very few people. At his hamlet a number of stakes are planted in the ground, and I counted fifty-four human skulls hung on their points. These were Matebele, who, unable to approach Sebituane on the island of Loyela, had returned sick and famishing. Moyara's father took advantage of their reduced condition, and after putting them to death, mounted their heads in the Batoka fashion. The old man who perpetrated this deed now lies in the middle of his son's huts, with a lot of rotten ivory over his grave. One can not help feeling thankful that the reign of such wretches is over. They inhabited the whole of this side of the country, and were probably the barrier to the extension of the Portuguese commerce in this direction. When looking at these skulls, I remarked to Moyara that many of them were those of mere boys. He assented readily, and pointed them out as such. I asked why his father had killed boys. "To show his fierceness," was the answer.

"Is it fierceness to kill boys?" "Yes; they had no business here."

When I told him that this probably would insure his own death if the Matebele came again, he replied, "When I hear of their coming I shall hide the bones."

He was evidently proud of these trophies of his father's ferocity, and I was assured by other Batoka that few strangers ever returned from a visit to this quarter. If a man wished to curry favor with a Batoka chief, he ascertained when a stranger was about to leave, and waylaid him at a distance from the town, and when he brought his head back to the chief, it was mounted as a trophy, the different chiefs vieing with each other as to which should mount the greatest number of skulls in his village.

If, as has been asserted, the Portuguese ever had a chain of trading stations across the country from Caconda to Tete, it must have passed through these people; but the total ignorance of the Zambesi flowing from north to south in the centre of the country, and the want of knowledge of the astonishing falls of Victoria, which excite the wonder of even the natives, together with the absence of any tradition of such a chain of stations, compel me to believe that they existed only on paper. This conviction is strengthened by the fact that when a late attempt was made to claim the honor of crossing the continent for the Portuguese, the only proof advanced was the journey of two black traders formerly mentioned, adorned with the name of "Portuguese".

If a chain of stations had existed, a few hundred names of the same sort might easily have been brought forward; and such is the love of barter among all the central Africans, that, had there existed a market for ivory, its value would have become known, and even that on the graves of the chiefs would not have been safe.

When about to leave Moyara on the 25th, he brought a root which, when pounded and sprinkled over the oxen, is believed to disgust the tsetse, so that it flies off without sucking the blood. He promised to show me the plant or tree if I would give him an ox; but, as we were traveling, and could not afford the time required for the experiment, so as not to be cheated (as I had too often been by my medical friends), I deferred the investigation till I returned. It is probably but an evanescent remedy, and capable of rendering the cattle safe during one night only. Moyara is now quite a dependent of the Makololo, and my new party, not being thoroughly drilled, forced him to carry a tusk for them. When I relieved him, he poured forth a shower of thanks at being allowed