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The banks of the Chobe, like those of the Zouga, are of soft calcareous tufa, and the river has cut out for itself a deep, perpendicular-sided bed. Where the banks are high, as at the spot where the wagons stood in 1851, they are covered with magnificent trees, the habitat of tsetse, and the retreat of various antelopes, wild hogs, zebras, buffaloes, and elephants.
In the central parts of the Cape Colony the cold in the winter is often severe, and the ground is covered with snow. At Kuruman snow seldom falls, but the frost is keen. There is frost even as far as the Chobe, and a partial winter in the Barotse valley, but beyond the Orange River we never have cold and damp combined.
Cold east winds prevail at this time; and as they come over the extensive flats inundated by the Chobe, as well as many other districts where pools of rain-water are now drying up, they may be supposed to be loaded with malaria and watery vapor, and many cases of fever follow.
Wagon Station on the Chobe, 18 20 0 23 50 0 . . . three miles S. of Sekeletu's Town. Cataract of Nambwe. 17 17 16 . . . July 31 Confluence of 17 7 31 . . . 1855, Aug. 22 . 1 Njoko and Zambesi.
The great quantity of water we had passed through was part of the annual inundation of the Chobe; and this, which appeared a large, deep river, filled in many parts with reeds, and having hippopotami in it, is only one of the branches by which it sends its superabundant water to the southeast.
The Makololo whom we met on the Chobe were delighted to see us; and as their chief Sebituane was about twenty miles down the river, Mr. Oswell and I proceeded in canoes to his temporary residence. He had come from the Barotse town of Naliele down to Sesheke as soon as he heard of white men being in search of him, and now came one hundred miles more to bid us welcome into his country.
"By your kindness it will be accomplished," said Debendra. "Then do you remain here on the watch; I will bring her to you." With these words Hira went out of the summer-house. "Come quickly; there is a thief in the garden." Then Dobe, Chobe, Paure, and Teowari, taking thick bamboo sticks in their hands, started off for the flower-garden.
At Bombwe we have the same trap, with radiated zeolite, probably mesotype, and it again appears at the confluence of the Chobe, farther down. As we passed up the river, the different villages of Banyeti turned out to present Sekeletu with food and skins, as their tribute.
Many of the rivers are very tortuous in their course, the Chobe and Simah particularly so; and, if we may receive the testimony of the natives, they form what anatomists call 'anastamosis', or a network of rivers.
Between these rapids there are reaches of still, deep water, of several miles in length. Beyond Katima-molelo to the confluence of the Chobe you have nearly a hundred miles again, of a river capable of being navigated in the same way as in the Barotse valley.
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