Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa, David Livingstone [novels for teenagers .TXT] 📗

round each separate cord, and dye this substance of a reddish color, many of them put me in mind of the ancient Egyptians. The great mass of dressed hair which they possess reaches to the shoulders, but when they intend to travel they draw it up to a bunch, and tie it on the top of the head.

They are cleanly in their habits.

As we did not come near human habitations, and could only take short stages on account of the illness of one of my men, I had an opportunity of observing the expedients my party resorted to in order to supply their wants.

Large white edible mushrooms are found on the ant-hills, and are very good.

The mokuri, a tuber which abounds in the Mopane country, they discovered by percussing the ground with stones; and another tuber, about the size of a turnip, called "bonga", is found in the same situations.

It does not determine to the joints like the mokuri, and in winter has a sensible amount of salt in it. A fruit called "ndongo" by the Makololo, "dongolo" by the Bambiri, resembles in appearance a small plum, which becomes black when ripe, and is good food, as the seeds are small.

Many trees are known by tradition, and one receives curious bits of information in asking about different fruits that are met with.

A tree named "shekabakadzi" is superior to all others for making fire by friction. As its name implies, women may even readily make fire by it when benighted.

The country here is covered over with well-rounded shingle and gravel of granite, gneiss with much talc in it, mica schist, and other rocks which we saw `in situ' between the Kafue and Loangwa. There are great mounds of soft red sand slightly coherent, which crumble in the hand with ease. The gravel and the sand drain away the water so effectually that the trees are exposed to the heat during a portion of the year without any moisture; hence they are not large, like those on the Zambesi, and are often scrubby. The rivers are all of the sandy kind, and we pass over large patches between this and Tete in which, in the dry season, no water is to be found. Close on our south, the hills of Lokole rise to a considerable height, and beyond them flows the Mazoe with its golden sands. The great numbers of pot-holes on the sides of sandstone ridges, when viewed in connection with the large banks of rolled shingle and washed sand which are met with on this side of the eastern ridge, may indicate that the sea in former times rolled its waves along its flanks. Many of the hills between the Kafue and Loangwa have their sides of the form seen in mud banks left by the tide. The pot-holes appear most abundant on low gray sandstone ridges here; and as the shingle is composed of the same rocks as the hills west of Zumbo, it looks as if a current had dashed along from the southeast in the line in which the pot-holes now appear; and if the current was deflected by those hills toward the Maravi country, north of Tete, it may have hollowed the rounded, water-worn caverns in which these people store their corn, and also hide themselves from their enemies.

I could detect no terraces on the land, but, if I am right in my supposition, the form of this part of the continent must once have resembled the curves or indentations seen on the southern extremity of the American continent.

In the indentation to the S.E., S., S.W., and W. of this, lie the principal gold-washings; and the line of the current, supposing it to have struck against the hills of Mburuma, shows the washings in the N. and N.E. of Tete.

We were tolerably successful in avoiding the villages, and slept one night on the flanks of the hill Zimika, where a great number of deep pot-holes afforded an abundant supply of good rain-water. Here, for the first time, we saw hills with bare, smooth, rocky tops, and we crossed over broad dikes of gneiss and syenitic porphyry: the directions in which they lay were N. and S. As we were now near to Tete, we were congratulating ourselves on having avoided those who would only have plagued us; but next morning some men saw us, and ran off to inform the neighboring villages of our passing. A party immediately pursued us, and, as they knew we were within call of Katolosa (Monomotapa), they threatened to send information to that chief of our offense, in passing through the country without leave. We were obliged to give them two small tusks; for, had they told Katolosa of our supposed offense, we should, in all probability, have lost the whole. We then went through a very rough, stony country without any path. Being pretty well tired out in the evening of the 2d of March, I remained at about eight miles distance from Tete, Tette, or Nyungwe. My men asked me to go on; I felt too fatigued to proceed, but sent forward to the commandant the letters of recommendation with which I had been favored in Angola by the bishop and others, and lay down to rest. Our food having been exhausted, my men had been subsisting for some time on roots and honey.

About two o'clock in the morning of the 3d we were aroused by two officers and a company of soldiers, who had been sent with the materials for a civilized breakfast and a "masheela" to bring me to Tete.

(Commandant's house: lat. 16d 9' 3" S., long. 33d 28' E.) My companions thought that we were captured by the armed men, and called me in alarm. When I understood the errand on which they had come, and had partaken of a good breakfast, though I had just before been too tired to sleep, all my fatigue vanished. It was the most refreshing breakfast I ever partook of, and I walked the last eight miles without the least feeling of weariness, although the path was so rough that one of the officers remarked to me, "This is enough to tear a man's life out of him."

The pleasure experienced in partaking of that breakfast was only equaled by the enjoyment of Mr. Gabriel's bed on my arrival at Loanda.

It was also enhanced by the news that Sebastopol had fallen and the war was finished.

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Note. -- Having neglected, in referring to the footprints of the rhinoceros, to mention what may be interesting to naturalists, I add it here in a note; that wherever the footprints are seen, there are also marks of the animal having plowed up the ground and bushes with his horn. This has been supposed to indicate that he is subject to "fits of ungovernable rage"; but, when seen, he appears rather to be rejoicing in his strength.

He acts as a bull sometimes does when he gores the earth with his horns.

The rhinoceros, in addition to this, stands on a clump of bushes, bends his back down, and scrapes the ground with his feet, throwing it out backward, as if to stretch and clean his toes, in the same way that a dog may be seen to do on a little grass: this is certainly not rage.

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Chapter 31.

Kind Reception from the Commandant -- His Generosity to my Men --

The Village of Tete -- The Population -- Distilled Spirits --

The Fort -- Cause of the Decadence of Portuguese Power --

Former Trade -- Slaves employed in Gold-washing -- Slave-trade drained the Country of Laborers -- The Rebel Nyaude's Stockade -- He burns Tete --

Kisaka's Revolt and Ravages -- Extensive Field of Sugar-cane --

The Commandant's good Reputation among the Natives --

Providential Guidance -- Seams of Coal -- A hot Spring --

Picturesque Country -- Water-carriage to the Coal-fields --

Workmen's Wages -- Exports -- Price of Provisions -- Visit Gold-washings --

The Process of obtaining the precious Metal -- Coal within a Gold-field --

Present from Major Sicard -- Natives raise Wheat, etc. --

Liberality of the Commandant -- Geographical Information from Senhor Candido -- Earthquakes -- Native Ideas of a Supreme Being --

Also of the Immortality and Transmigration of Souls -- Fondness for Display at Funerals -- Trade Restrictions -- Former Jesuit Establishment --

State of Religion and Education at Tete -- Inundation of the Zambesi --

Cotton cultivated -- The fibrous Plants Conge and Buaze --

Detained by Fever -- The Kumbanzo Bark -- Native Medicines -- Iron, its Quality -- Hear of Famine at Kilimane -- Death of a Portuguese Lady --

The Funeral -- Disinterested Kindness of the Portuguese.

I was most kindly received by the commandant Tito Augusto d'Araujo Sicard, who did every thing in his power to restore me from my emaciated condition; and, as this was still the unhealthy period at Kilimane, he advised me to remain with him until the following month.

He also generously presented my men with abundant provisions of millet; and, by giving them lodgings in a house of his own until they could erect their own huts, he preserved them from the bite of the tampans, here named Carapatos.* We had heard frightful accounts of this insect while among the Banyai, and Major Sicard assured me that to strangers its bite is more especially dangerous, as it sometimes causes fatal fever.

It may please our homoeopathic friends to hear that, in curing the bite of the tampan, the natives administer one of the insects bruised in the medicine employed.

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Another insect, resembling a maggot, burrows into the feet of the natives and sucks their blood. Mr. Westwood says, "The tampan is a large species of mite, closely allied to the poisonous bug (as it is called) of Persia, `Argos reflexus', respecting which such marvelous accounts have been recorded, and which the statement respecting the carapato or tampan would partially confirm."

Mr. W. also thinks that the poison-yielding larva called N'gwa is a "species of chrysomelidae. The larvae of the British species of that family exude a fetid yellow thickish fluid when alarmed, but he has not heard that any of them are at all poisonous."

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The village of Tete is built on a long slope down to the river, the fort being close to the water. The rock beneath is gray sandstone, and has the appearance of being crushed away from the river: the strata have thus a crumpled form. The hollow between each crease is a street, the houses being built upon the projecting fold.

The rocks at the top of the slope are much higher than the fort, and of course completely command it. There is then a large valley, and beyond that an oblong hill called Karueira. The whole of the adjacent country is rocky and broken, but every available spot is under cultivation.

The stone houses in Tete are cemented with mud instead of lime, and thatched with reeds and grass. The rains, having washed out the mud between the stones, give all the houses a rough, untidy appearance.

No lime was known to be found nearer than Mozambique; some used in making seats in the verandas had actually been brought all that distance.

The Portuguese evidently knew nothing of the pink and white marbles which I found at the Mbai, and another rivulet, named the Unguesi, near it, and of which I brought home specimens, nor yet of the dolomite which lies so near to