a company of soldiers with an officer arrived,
bringing the materials for a civilised breakfast, and a litter in which
to carry him. He felt so greatly revived by the breakfast, that he was
able to walk the whole way.

He was received in the kindest way by Major Sicard, the commandant of
Tete, who provided also lodging and provision for his men.

Tete is a mere village, built on a slope reaching to the water, close to
which the fort is situated. There are about thirty European houses; the
rest of the buildings, inhabited by the natives, are of wattle and daub.

Formerly, besides gold-dust and ivory, large quantities of grain,
coffee, sugar, oil, and indigo were exported from Tete, but, on the
establishment of the slave trade, the merchants found a more speedy way
of becoming rich, by selling off their slaves, and the plantations and
gold washings were abandoned, the labourers having been exported to the
Brazils. Many of the white men then followed their slaves. After this,
a native of Goa, Nyaude by name, built a stockade at the confluence of
the Luenya and Zambesi, took the commandant of Tete, who attacked him,
prisoner, and sent his son Bonga with a force against that town and
burned it. Others followed his example, till commerce, before rendered
stagnant by the slave trade, was totally obstructed.

On the north shore of the Zambesi several fine seams of coal exist,
which Dr Livingstone examined. The natives only collect gold from the
neighbourhood whenever they wish to purchase calico. On finding a piece
or flake of gold, however, they bury it again, believing that it is the
seed of the gold, and, though knowing its value, prefer losing it rather
than, as they suppose, the whole future crop.

Dr Livingstone found it necessary to leave most of his men here, and
Major Sicard liberally gave them a portion of land that they might
cultivate it, supplying them in the mean time with corn. He also
allowed the young men to go out and hunt elephants with his servants,
that they might purchase goods with the ivory and dry meat, in order
that they might take them back with them on returning to their own
homes. He also supplied them with cloth. Sixty or seventy at once
accepted his offer, delighted with the thoughts of engaging in so
profitable an enterprise. He also supplied the doctor with an outfit,
refusing to take the payment which was offered.

The forests in the neighbourhood abound with elephants, and the