18Th.  Yesterday we rested under a broad-spreading fig-tree.  Large numbers of buffaloes and water-antelopes were feeding quietly in the meadows; the people have either no guns or no ammunition, or they would not be so tame.  Pangola visited us, and presented us with food.  In few other countries would one hundred and fourteen sturdy vagabonds be supported by the generosity of the head men and villagers, and whatever they gave be presented with politeness.  My men got pretty well supplied individually, for they went into the villages and commenced dancing.  The young women were especially pleased with the new steps they had to show, though I suspect many of them were invented for the occasion, and would say, “Dance for me, and I will grind corn for you.”  At every fresh instance of liberality, Sekwebu said, “Did not I tell you that these people had hearts, while we were still at Linyanti?” All agreed that the character he had given was true, and some remarked, “Look! although we have been so long away from home, not one of us has become lean.”  It was a fact that we had been all well supplied either with meat by my gun or their own spears, or food from the great generosity of the inhabitants.  Pangola promised to ferry us across the Zambesi, but failed to fulfill his promise.  He seemed to wish to avoid offending his neighbor Mpende by aiding us to escape from his hands, so we proceeded along the bank.  Although we were in doubt as to our reception by Mpende, I could not help admiring the beautiful country as we passed along.  There is, indeed, only a small part under cultivation in this fertile valley, but my mind naturally turned to the comparison of it with Kolobeng, where we waited anxiously during months for rain, and only a mere thunder-shower followed.  I shall never forget the dry, hot east winds of that region; the yellowish, sultry, cloudless sky; the grass and all the plants drooping from drought, the cattle lean, the people dispirited, and our own hearts sick from hope deferred.  There we often heard in the dead of the night the shrill whistle of the rain-doctor calling for rain that would not come, while here we listened to the rolling thunder by night, and beheld the swelling valleys adorned with plenty by day.  We have rain almost daily, and every thing is beautifully fresh and green.  I felt somewhat as people do on coming ashore after a long voyage—­inclined to look upon the landscape in the most favorable light.  The hills are covered with forests, and there is often a long line of fleecy cloud lying on them about midway up; they are very beautiful.  Finding no one willing to aid us in crossing the river, we proceeded to the village of the chief Mpende.  A fine large conical hill now appeared to the N.N.E.; it is the highest I have seen in these parts, and at some points it appears to be two cones joined together, the northern one being a little lower than the southern.  Another high hill stands on the same side to the N.E., and, from