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Updated: June 6, 2025
They had been forming for some time past a huge trap, called a hopo, about three or four miles away, near a stream in the neighbourhood, at which large numbers of game were accustomed to assemble. As the narrow end was toward the village, we were able to examine it on our way.
A site for the hopo was chosen about half a mile from the forest edge, and the construction of it was immediately commenced. Anxious to learn the result of another attempt at capturing giraffes, the hunters toiled early and late.
We found Chitokola's village, called Paritala, a pleasant one on the east side of the Adiampwé Valley. Many elephants and other animals feed in the valley, and we saw the Bechuana Hopo again after many years. The Ambarré, otherwise Nyumbo plant, has a pea-shaped, or rather papilionaceous flower, with a fine scent. It seems to grow quite wild; its flowers are yellow.
The Hopo is a funnel-shaped fence which encloses a considerable tract of country: a "drive" is organised, and animals of all descriptions are urged on till they become jammed together in the neck of the hopo, where they are speared to death or else destroyed in a number of pitfalls placed there for the purpose. The ordeal poison. Progress northwards. An African forest. Destruction by Mazitu.
The hopo consists of two hedges formed of stakes and boughs driven into the ground at a considerable distance from each other, toward the end opening into the wild part of the country where animals are likely to be found, and closing in toward each other till they almost approach.
Then forming a circuit for miles around, they drove the game buffaloes, zebras, gnus, antelopes, and the like into the mouth of the hopo, and along its narrowing lane, until they plunged pell-mell in one confused, writhing, struggling mass into the pit, where they were speared at leisure. The precarious mode of life occasioned by the long drought interfered sadly with the labors of the mission.
Such is the African Corrall, or Hopo, by which whole herds of quaggas, elands, and buffalo are often destroyed. The trap consists of two hedges in the form of the letter V, which are very high and thick at the angle. Instead of the hedges being joined at this point, they are made to form a lane about two hundred feet in length, at the extremity of which a giant pit is formed.
It went on a little way, and then down it sank on the ground. We had no doubt that it was one of the creatures which had been speared at the hopo hunt when Stanley was present, and having escaped, had wandered thus far from its usual haunts. Scarcely had it disappeared, when we saw coming from a distance a large flight of crows, who with loud croakings descended to the ground.
A suitable place for the trap, Macora remembered having seen, a few miles down the river; and thither they repaired. On the way, they passed the ruins of the deserted village, and many of the natives recognised amid the heaps of rubbish the places that had once been their homes. Five miles farther down, they reached the place which was to be enclosed as a hopo.
The hunters now extended themselves, each man keeping within sight of the other, forming a circle round the broad entrance of the hopo of four or five miles in extent, thus surrounding a large area. I could see within it immense numbers of animals, giraffes, zebras, buffaloes, gnus, pallas, rhinoceroses, hartbeests, and, indeed, all sorts of deer, large and small.
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