It was offered to me, but like Miss Inez, I preferred coffee.
During the meal and afterwards while we smoked upon the veranda, I told them as much as I thought desirable of my plans.

I said that I was engaged upon a journey of exploration of the country beyond the Zambesi, and that having heard of this settlement, which, by the way, was called Strathmuir, as I gathered after a place in far away Scotland where the Captain had been born and passed his childhood, I had come here to inquire as to how to cross the great river, and about other things.
The Captain was interested, especially when I informed him that I was that same "Hunter Quatermain" of whom he had heard in past years, but he told me that it would be impossible to take the waggon down into the low bush-veld which we could see beneath us, as there all the oxen would die of the bite of the tsetse fly.

I answered that I was aware of this and proposed to try to make an arrangement to leave it in his charge till I returned.
"That might be managed, Mr.Quatermain," he answered.

"But, man, will you ever return?
They say there are queer folk living on the other side of the Zambesi, savage men who are cannibals, Amahagger I think they call them.

It was they who in past years cleaned out all this country, except a few river tribes who live in floating huts or on islands among the reeds, and that's why it is so empty.