him in and drown him.  When lying in the water watching for prey, the body never appears.  Many calves are lost also, and it is seldom that a number of cows can swim over at Sesheke without some loss.  I never could avoid shuddering on seeing my men swimming across these branches, after one of them had been caught by the thigh and taken below.  He, however, retained, as nearly all of them in the most trying circumstances do, his full presence of mind, and, having a small, square, ragged-edged javelin with him, when dragged to the bottom gave the alligator a stab behind the shoulder.  The alligator, writhing in pain, left him, and he came out with the deep marks of the reptile’s teeth on his thigh.  Here the people have no antipathy to persons who have met with such an adventure, but, in the Bamangwato and Bakwain tribes, if a man is either bitten or even has had water splashed over him by the reptile’s tail, he is expelled his tribe.  When on the Zouga we saw one of the Bamangwato living among the Bayeiye, who had the misfortune to have been bitten and driven out of his tribe in consequence.  Fearing that I would regard him with the same disgust which his countrymen profess to feel, he would not tell me the cause of his exile, but the Bayeiye informed me of it, and the scars of the teeth were visible on his thigh.  If the Bakwains happened to go near an alligator they would spit on the ground, and indicate its presence by saying “Boleo ki bo”—­“There is sin”.  They imagine the mere sight of it would give inflammation of the eyes; and though they eat the zebra without hesitation, yet if one bites a man he is expelled the tribe, and obliged to take his wife and family away to the Kalahari.  These curious relics of the animal-worship of former times scarcely exist among the Makololo.  Sebituane acted on the principle, “Whatever is food for men is food for me;” so no man is here considered unclean.  The Barotse appear inclined to pray to alligators and eat them too, for when I wounded a water-antelope, called mochose, it took to the water; when near the other side of the river an alligator appeared at its tail, and then both sank together.  Mashauana, who was nearer to it than I, told me that, “though he had called to it to let his meat alone, it refused to listen.”  One day we passed some Barotse lads who had speared an alligator, and were waiting in expectation of its floating soon after.  The meat has a strong musky odor, not at all inviting for any one except the very hungry.

When we had gone thirty or forty miles above Libonta we sent eleven of our captives to the west, to the chief called Makoma, with an explanatory message.  This caused some delay; but as we were loaded with presents of food from the Makololo, and the wild animals were in enormous herds, we fared sumptuously.  It was grievous, however, to shoot the lovely creatures, they were so tame.  With but little skill in stalking, one could easily get within fifty or sixty yards of