Religion & morality > David Livingstone

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they have. And they have bird-fanciers there, too,
who carry canaries about in pretty cages ; and ladies
with lap-dogs, which they will by-and-by eat. Our
ladies do not exhibit their affection for canine pets in
that way, at all events, nor do they eat moles and mice,
as, in the absence of other animal food, these people
do ; the traps set for “ such small deer ” may be seen
everywhere in the woods, with which the villages are
generally surrounded. Up on the roofs of the huts
fly the cackling hens, to lay their eggs in the baskets
provided for them there, and when any travellers
arrive, there is much noisy offering of these and other
articles of food, and chaffering and haggling by men,
women, and children, but all with the greatest civility
and good temper.
Now on through the zigzag forest paths, beset with
climbing plants, through which a way has often to be
cut, and sometimes bitten; for the carriers, after tugging
at the lithe yet tough stems that bar their progress,
apply their teeth to them, and so break through the
obstruction. Thus, slowly toiling on, they reach
another river, abounding in crocodiles and hippopotami.
Then they get among bogs, surrounded by clumps of
straight evergreen trees; bogs on whose slimy sur¬
faces the prismatic tints are exhibited, telling of their
ferruginous origin. The river glens are green and
shady, a few feathered songsters enliven the solitude,
and there is a chittering and humming all about, which
tells of insect life; but the level plateaux between the
rivers are bare and dreary enough, presenting scarcely
any signs of animated existence.