February 1st. We met some native traders, and, as many of my men were now in a state of nudity, I bought some American calico marked “Lawrence Mills, Lowell”, with two small tusks, and distributed it among the most needy.  After leaving Mozinkwa’s we came to the Zingesi, a sand-rivulet in flood (lat. 15d 38’ 34” S., long. 31d 1’ E.).  It was sixty or seventy yards wide, and waist-deep.  Like all these sand-rivers, it is for the most part dry; but by digging down a few feet, water is to be found, which is percolating along the bed on a stratum of clay.  This is the phenomenon which is dignified by the name of “a river flowing under ground.”  In trying to ford this I felt thousands of particles of coarse sand striking my legs, and the slight disturbance of our footsteps caused deep holes to be made in the bed.  The water, which is almost always very rapid in them, dug out the sand beneath our feet in a second or two, and we were all sinking by that means so deep that we were glad to relinquish the attempt to ford it before we got half way over; the oxen were carried away down into the Zambesi.  These sand-rivers remove vast masses of disintegrated rock before it is fine enough to form soil.  The man who preceded me was only thigh-deep, but the disturbance caused by his feet made it breast-deep for me.  The shower of particles and gravel which struck against my legs gave me the idea that the amount of matter removed by every freshet must be very great.  In most rivers where much wearing is going on, a person diving to the bottom may hear literally thousands of stones knocking against each other.  This attrition, being carried on for hundreds of miles in different rivers, must have an effect greater than if all the pestles and mortars and mills of the world were grinding and wearing away the rocks.  The pounding to which I refer may be heard most distinctly in the Vaal River, when that is slightly in flood.  It was there I first heard it.  In the Leeambye, in the middle of the country, where there is no discoloration, and little carried along but sand, it is not to be heard.

While opposite the village of a head man called Mosusa, a number of elephants took refuge on an island in the river.  There were two males, and a third not full grown; indeed, scarcely the size of a female.  This was the first instance I had ever seen of a comparatively young one with the males, for they usually remain with the female herd till as large as their dams.  The inhabitants were very anxious that my men should attack them, as they go into the gardens on the islands, and do much damage.  The men went, but the elephants ran about half a mile to the opposite end of the island, and swam to the main land with their probosces above the water, and, no canoe being near, they escaped.  They swim strongly, with the proboscis erect in the air.  I was not very desirous to have one of these animals killed, for we understood that when we passed Mpende we came into a country where the game-laws