"If I had been told that I would get into a position where, in common with 30,000 other people, I would love and honour this young man as my Chief, I would have said this was impossible for a European intellectual, even with a Highland background. This book shows just how it happened." -NM

On its first publication, in 1966, Geoffrey Household wrote:

Now, here really is a love story, and I'll tumble over myself, with the enthusiasm of Mrs. Mitchison's own sentences, to imagine her reasons why we should read it. Because she is a woman with the brains of a Haldane, the spiritual insight of a Highlander and the passionate loyalty of a mother. Because she understands Bechuanaland and her beloved tribe. Because she longs to pass on the smell of the smoke and cattle in the evening, the touch of the arm of her adopted son and nominal Chief around her shoulders. To which we can only answer: one of them would do, dear Mma (Setswana for Ma and presumably pronounced much the same), but to be offered the lot is riches indeed.

It all started with a meeting of eyes at - of all places!-a British Council party.