lama, who willingly offered them canoes for the passage across
the next day.[37]

As one listens to the report that the men give of this mighty river, he
instinctively bends his eyes on a dark burden laid in the canoe! How
ardently would he have scanned it whose body thus passes across these
waters, and whose spirit, in its last hours' sojourn in this world,
wandered in thought and imagination to its stream!

It would seem that the Luapula at this point is double the width of the
Zambesi at Shupanga. This gives a breadth of fully four miles. A man
could not be seen on the opposite bank: trees looked small: a gun could
be heard, but no shouting would ever reach a person across the
river--such is the description given by men who were well able to
compare the Luapula with the Zambesi. Taking to the canoes, they were
able to use the "m'phondo," or punting pole, for a distance through
reeds, then came clear deep water for some four hundred yards, again a
broad reedy expanse, followed by another deep part, succeeded in turn by
another current not so broad as those previously paddled across, and
then, as on the starting side, gradually shoaling water, abounding in
reeds. Two islands lay just above the crossing-place. Using pole and
paddle alternately, the passage took them fully two hours across this
enormous torrent, which carries off the waters of Bangweolo towards the
north.

A sad mishap befell the donkey the first night of camping beyond the
Luapula, and this faithful and sorely-tried servant was doomed to end
his career at this spot!

According to custom, a special stable was built for him close to the
men. In the middle of the night a great disturbance, coupled with the
shouting of Amoda, aroused the camp. The men rushed out and found the
stable broken down and the donkey gone. Snatching, some logs, they set
fire to the grass, as it was pitch dark, and by the light saw a lion
close to the body of the poor animal, which was quite dead. Those who
had caught up their guns on the first alarm fired a volley, and the
lion made off. It was evident that the donkey had been seized by the
nose, and instantly killed. At daylight the spoor showed that the guns
had taken effect. The lion's blood lay in a broad track (for he was
apparently injured in the back, and could only drag himself along); but
the footprints of a second lion were too plain to make it advisable to
track him far in the thick cover he had reached, and so the s