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Updated: June 16, 2025
In his first journey, in which he braved the perils of the South African thirst lands, he reached the broad and placid expanse of Lake Ngami, covering an area of three hundred square miles. In the gradual desiccation of that region, the lake has now entirely disappeared. Its place is wholly occupied by a partly marshy plain covered with reeds, and no vestige of water surface is to be seen.
Those found at Lake Ngami, with large horns and standing six feet high, probably come from the same quarter. The goats are also small, and domestic fowls throughout this country are of a very small size, and even dogs, except where the inhabitants have had an opportunity of improving the breed by importation from the Portuguese.
* Since writing the above statement, it has received confirmation in the reported death of Mr. Wahlberg while hunting elephants on foot at Lake Ngami. Advancing to some wells beyond Letloche, at a spot named Kanne, we found them carefully hedged round by the people of a Bakalahari village situated near the spot.
But on many a long and perilous journey she went with him. "When I took her," writes Livingstone, "on two occasions to Lake Ngami and far beyond, she endured more than some who have written large books of travel." One of Livingstone's first mission stations was Mabotsa, where he stayed a year, and in that short time gained the love of the people.
Twelve days after our departure from the wagons at Ngabisane we came to the northeast end of Lake Ngami; and on August 1, 1849, we went down together to the broad part, and for the first time this fine-looking sheet of water was beheld by Europeans. The direction of the lake seemed to be north-northeast and south-southwest by compass.
The prospect of a highway capable of being traversed by boats to an unexplored fertile region so filled the mind of Livingstone that, when he came to the lake, this discovery seemed of comparatively little importance. To us, indeed, whose ideas of a lake are formed from Superior and Huron, the Ngami seems but an insignificant affair.
On our way from Khopong, along the ancient river-bed which forms the pathway to Boatlanama, I found a species of cactus, being the third I have seen in the country, namely, one in the colony with a bright red flower, one at Lake Ngami, the flower of which was liver-colored, and the present one, flower unknown.
The exact position of the Lake Ngami had, for half a century at least, been correctly pointed out by the natives, who had visited it when rains were more copious in the Desert than in more recent times, and many attempts had been made to reach it by passing through the Desert in the direction indicated; but it was found impossible, even for Griquas, who, having some Bushman blood in them, may be supposed more capable of enduring thirst than Europeans.
Macabe on his Return from Lake Ngami The hot Wind of the Desert Electric State of the Atmosphere Flock of Swifts Reach Litubaruba The Cave Lepelole Superstitions regarding it Impoverished State of the Bakwains Retaliation on the Boers Slavery Attachment of the Bechuanas to Children Hydrophobia unknown Diseases of the Bakwains few in number Yearly Epidemics Hasty Burials Ophthalmia Native Doctors Knowledge of Surgery at a very low Ebb Little Attendance given to Women at their Confinements The "Child Medicine" Salubrity of the Climate well adapted for Invalids suffering from pulmonary Complaints.
Even at this time he heard of a fresh-water lake far to the north. It was called Ngami, and he hoped to see it one day. From Kuruman he made several journeys in different directions to gain a knowledge of the tribes and their languages, to minister to their sick and win their confidence.
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