ss traps are seen, set for mice, in all the forests of
Londa. The vegetable diet leaves great craving for flesh, and I have no
doubt but that, when an ordinary quantity of mixed food is supplied to
freed slaves, they actually do feel more comfortable than they did at
home. Their assertions, however, mean but little, for they always try to
give an answer to please, and if one showed them a nugget of gold, they
would generally say that these abounded in their country.

One could detect, in passing, the variety of character found among
the owners of gardens and villages. Some villages were the pictures of
neatness. We entered others enveloped in a wilderness of weeds, so high
that, when sitting on ox-back in the middle of the village, we could
only see the tops of the huts. If we entered at midday, the owners
would come lazily forth, pipe in hand, and leisurely puff away in dreamy
indifference. In some villages weeds are not allowed to grow; cotton,
tobacco, and different plants used as relishes are planted round the
huts; fowls are kept in cages, and the gardens present the pleasant
spectacle of different kinds of grain and pulse at various periods of
their growth. I sometimes admired the one class, and at times wished I
could have taken the world easy for a time like the other. Every village
swarms with children, who turn out to see the white man pass, and run
along with strange cries and antics; some run up trees to get a good
view: all are agile climbers throughout Londa. At friendly villages they
have scampered alongside our party for miles at a time. We usually made
a little hedge around our sheds; crowds of women came to the entrance of
it, with children on their backs, and long pipes in their mouths, gazing
at us for hours. The men, rather than disturb them, crawled through a
hole in the hedge, and it was common to hear a man in running off say
to them, "I am going to tell my mamma to come and see the white man's
oxen."

In continuing our W.N.W. course, we met many parties of native traders,
each carrying some pieces of cloth and salt, with a few beads to
barter for bees'-wax. They are all armed with Portuguese guns, and have
cartridges with iron balls. When we meet we usually stand a few minutes.
They present a little salt, and we give a bit of ox-hide, or some other
trifle, and then part with mutual good wishes. The hide of the oxen we
slaughtered had been a valuable addition to our resources, for we found
it in