the necessaries and all the luxuries of life
needed in Matabililand,--have to be sent up along this road, which is
more used than the alternative route through the Transvaal from Pretoria
_via_ Pietersburg. No wonder all sorts of articles are costly in
Bulawayo, when it has taken eight or ten weeks to bring them from the
nearest railway terminus. The waggons do most of their journeying by
night, allowing the oxen to rest during the heat of the day. One of the
minor troubles of travel is the delay which ensues when one's vehicle
meets a string of waggons, sometimes nearly a quarter of a mile long,
for each has eight, nine, or even ten, span of oxen. They move very
slowly, and at night, when the track happens to be a narrow one among
trees, it is not easy to get past. Except for these waggons the road is
lonely. One sees few natives, though the narrow footpaths crossing the
wheel-track show that the country is inhabited. Here and there one
passes a large native village, such as Ramoutsie and Machudi, but small
hamlets are rare, and solitary huts still rarer. The country is of
course very thinly peopled in proportion to its resources, for, what
with the good pasture nearly everywhere and the fertile land in many
places, it could support eight or ten times the number of Barolongs,
Bamangwato, and other Bechuanas who now live scattered over its vast
area. It is not the beasts of prey that are to blame for this, for, with
the disappearance of game, lions have become extremely scarce, and
leopards and lynxes are no longer common. Few quadrupeds are seen, and
not many kinds of birds. Vultures, hawks, and a species something like a
magpie, with four pretty white patches upon the wings and a long tail,
are the commonest, together with bluish-grey guinea-fowl, pigeons and
sometimes a small partridge. In some parts there are plenty of bustards,
prized as dainties, but we saw very few. Away from the track some buck
of the commoner kinds may still be found, and farther to the west there
is still plenty of big game in the Kalahari Desert. But the region which
we traversed is almost as unattractive to the sportsman as it is to the
lover of beauty. It is, indeed, one of the dullest parts of South
Africa.

The next stage in the journey is marked by Palapshwye, Khama's capital.
This is the largest native town south of the Zambesi, for it has a
population estimated at over 20,000. It came into being only a few years
ago, when Khama, having