Many of them were seized with a shivering sickness, as if from excessive cold; they had never seen the like before.

They made great fires, and laid the shivering wretches down before them; but, pile on wood as they might, they could not raise heat enough to drive the cold out of the bodies of the sufferers, and they shivered on till they died.

But, though all preferred the highlands, they were afraid to go there, lest the Matebele should come and rob them of their much-loved cattle.

Sebituane, with all his veterans, could not withstand that enemy; and how could they be resisted, now that most of the brave warriors were dead?
The young men would break, and run away the moment they saw the terrible Matebele, being as much afraid of them as the black conquered tribes are of the Makololo.
"But if the Doctor and his wife," said the chiefs and counsellors, "would come and live with us, we would remove to the highlands at once, as Moselekatse would not attack a place where the daughter of his friend, Moffat, was living." The Makololo are by far the most intelligent and enterprising of the tribes we have met.

None but brave and daring men remained long with Sebituane, his stern discipline soon eradicated cowardice from his army.
Death was the inevitable doom of the coward.