Page:Seven Years in South Africa v2.djvu/196

 and lastly from the Portuguese traders, and reducing the days’ journeys to miles, I think that I am quite borne out in assigning the boundaries as they are marked in my map; that is to say, with the Mashukulumbe on the north and east, the Bamashis on the west, and the Bamangwatos and Matabele country on the south.

Sepopo’s name in the Serotse dialect means “a dream,” and his mother was called Mangala. After introducing me to the principal chiefs and officials that were then in Nesheke, amongst whom was Kapella the commander-in-chief, he presented Mashoku the executioner, a repulsive Mabunda, and his two fathers-in-law, who were about to become his sons-in-law as well, as, having married their daughters, he was going to give them two of his own young daughters as wives in return.

During the time that these introductions were going on, honey-beer was being drunk, and it occurred to me that Lunga, the handsomest of the ladies, took an uncommonly large share. Very shortly afterwards three Marutse came into the tent uttering a loud cry of “Shangwe,” and each carrying a buffalo’s tail; they had been sent by the king to procure some meat for Blockley and myself. Before I left, Sepopo pointed out to me his two doctors who provided him with charms when he went hunting.

I spent the remainder of the day in making an investigation of the town, returning in the evening to the royal residence, where I found that Makumba had just come in from Impalera, bringing the melancholy intelligence that Y., the trader that I had met at Schneemann’s Pan, and had urged to