the pitfalls designed by the Bayeiye to entrap the animals
as they come to drink. These are about seven or eight feet deep, three
or four feet wide at the mouth, and gradually decrease till they are
only about a foot wide at the bottom. The mouth is an oblong square (the
only square thing made by the Bechuanas, for every thing else is round),
and the long diameter at the surface is about equal to the depth. The
decreasing width toward the bottom is intended to make the animal wedge
himself more firmly in by his weight and struggles. The pitfalls are
usually in pairs, with a wall a foot thick left uncut between the ends
of each, so that if the beast, when it feels its fore legs descending,
should try to save itself from going in altogether by striding the hind
legs, he would spring forward and leap into the second with a force
which insures the fall of his whole body into the trap. They are covered
with great care. All the excavated earth is removed to a distance, so as
not to excite suspicion in the minds of the animals. Reeds and grass are
laid across the top; above this the sand is thrown, and watered so as to
appear exactly like the rest of the spot. Some of our party plumped into
these pitfalls more than once, even when in search of them, in order to
open them to prevent the loss of our cattle. If an ox sees a hole, he
carefully avoids it; and old elephants have been known to precede the
herd and whisk off the coverings of the pitfalls on each side all the
way down to the water. We have known instances in which the old among
these sagacious animals have actually lifted the young out of the trap.

The trees which adorn the banks are magnificent. Two enormous baobabs
('Adansonia digitata'), or mowanas, grow near its confluence with the
lake where we took the observations for the latitude (20d 20' S.). We
were unable to ascertain the longitude of the lake, as our watches were
useless; it may be between 22 Deg. and 23 Deg. E. The largest of the two
baobabs was 76 feet in girth. The palmyra appears here and there among
trees not met with in the south. The mokuchong, or moshoma, bears an
edible fruit of indifferent quality, but the tree itself would be a fine
specimen of arboreal beauty in any part of the world. The trunk is often
converted into canoes. The motsouri, which bears a pink plum containing
a pleasant acid juice, resembles an orange-tree in its dark evergreen
foliage, and a cypress in its form. It was now winter-