n to crow in a forest, the
owner would give it a beating, by way of teaching it not to be guilty of
crowing at unseasonable hours.

The women here are in the habit of piercing the upper lip, and gradually
enlarging the orifice until they can insert a shell. The lip then
appears drawn out beyond the perpendicular of the nose, and gives them a
most ungainly aspect. Sekwebu remarked, "These women want to make their
mouths like those of ducks;" and, indeed, it does appear as if they
had the idea that female beauty of lip had been attained by the
'Ornithorhynchus paradoxus' alone. This custom prevails throughout the
country of the Maravi, and no one could see it without confessing that
fashion had never led women to a freak more mad. We had rains now every
day, and considerable cloudiness, but the sun often burst through with
scorching intensity. All call out against it then, saying, "O the sun!
that is rain again." It was worth noticing that my companions never
complained of the heat while on the highlands, but when we descended
into the lowlands of Angola, and here also, they began to fret on
account of it. I myself felt an oppressive steaminess in the atmosphere
which I had not experienced on the higher lands.

As the game was abundant and my party very large, I had still to supply
their wants with the gun. We slaughtered the oxen only when unsuccessful
in hunting. We always entered into friendly relations with the head
men of the different villages, and they presented grain and other food
freely. One man gave a basinful of rice, the first we met with in the
country. It is never seen in the interior. He said he knew it was "white
man's corn", and when I wished to buy some more, he asked me to give him
a slave. This was the first symptom of the slave-trade on this side of
the country. The last of these friendly head men was named Mobala; and
having passed him in peace, we had no anticipation of any thing else;
but, after a few hours, we reached Selole or Chilole, and found that
he not only considered us enemies, but had actually sent an express to
raise the tribe of Mburuma against us. All the women of Selole had fled,
and the few people we met exhibited symptoms of terror. An armed party
had come from Mburuma in obedience to the call; but the head man of the
company, being Mburuma's brother, suspecting that it was a hoax, came to
our encampment and told us the whole. When we explained our objects, he
told us that Mburuma