By way of gaining their confidence, I showed them my hair,
which is considered a curiosity in all this region.
They said,
"Is that hair? It is the mane of a lion, and not hair at all."
Some thought that I had made a wig of lion's mane, as they sometimes do
with fibres of the "ife", and dye it black, and twist it so as to resemble
a mass of their own wool. I could not return the joke by telling them
that theirs was not hair, but the wool of sheep, for they have none of these
in the country; and even though they had, as Herodotus remarked,
"the African sheep are clothed with hair, and men's heads with wool."
So I had to be content with asserting that mine was the real original hair,
such as theirs would have been had it not been scorched and frizzled
by the sun. In proof of what the sun could do, I compared
my own bronzed face and hands, then about the same in complexion
as the lighter-colored Makololo, with the white skin of my chest.
They readily believed that, as they go nearly naked and fully exposed
to that influence, we might be of common origin after all.
Here, as every where, when heat and moisture are combined, the people
are very dark, but not quite black. There is always a shade of brown
in the most deeply colored. I showed my watch and pocket compass,
which are considered great curiosities; but, though the lady
was called on by her husband to look, she would not be persuaded
to approach near enough.
These people are more superstitious than any we had yet encountered;
though still only building their village, they had found time to erect
two little sheds at the chief dwelling in it, in which were placed two pots
having charms in them. When asked what medicine they contained,
they replied, "Medicine for the Barimo;" but when I rose and looked into them,
they said they were medicine for the game. Here we saw
the first evidence of the existence of idolatry in the remains of an old idol
at a deserted village. It was simply a human head carved on a block of wood.
Certain charms mixed with red ochre and white pipe-clay are dotted over them
when they are in use; and a crooked stick is used in the same way for an idol
when they have no professional carver.
As the Leeba seemed still to come from the direction in which we wished to go,
I was desirous of proceeding farther up with the canoes;
but Nyamoana was anxious that we should allow her people
to conduct us to her brother Shinte; and when I explained
the advantage of water-carriage, she represented that her brother
did not live near the river, and, moreover, there was a cataract in front,
over which it would be difficult to convey the canoes. She was afraid, too,
that the Balobale, whose country lies to the west of the river,
not knowing the objects for which we had come, would kill us.
To my reply that I had been so often threatened with death
if I visited a new tribe that I was now more afraid of killing any one
than of being killed, she rejoined that the Balobale would not kill me,
but the Makololo would all be sacrificed as their enemies.
This produced considerable effect on my companions, and inclined them
to the plan of Nyamoana, of going to the town of her brother
rather than ascending the Leeba. The arrival of Manenko herself on the scene
threw so much weight into the scale on their side that I was forced
to yield the point.
Manenko was a tall, strapping woman about twenty, distinguished by
a profusion of ornaments and medicines hung round her person;
the latter are supposed to act as charms. Her body was smeared all over
with a mixture of fat and red ochre, as a protection against the weather;
a necessary precaution, for, like most of the Balonda ladies,
she was otherwise in a state of frightful nudity. This was not
from want of clothing, for, being a chief, she might have been as well clad
as any of her subjects, but from her peculiar ideas of elegance in dress.
When she arrived with her husband, Sambanza, they listened for some time
to the statements I was making to the people of Nyamoana, after which
the husband, acting as spokesman, commenced an oration, stating the reasons
for their coming, and, during every two or three seconds of the delivery,
he picked up a little sand, and rubbed it on the upper part
of his arms and chest. This is a common mode of salutation in Londa;
and when they wish to be excessively polite, they bring
a quantity of ashes or pipe-clay in a piece of skin, and, taking up handfuls,
rub it on the chest and upper front part of each arm; others, in saluting,
drum their ribs with their elbows; while others still touch the ground
with one cheek after the other, and clap their hands. The chiefs go through
the manoeuvre of rubbing the sand on the arms, but only make a feint
at picking up some. When Sambanza had finished his oration,
he rose up, and showed his ankles ornamented with a bundle of copper rings;
had they been very heavy, they would have made him adopt a straggling walk.
Some chiefs have really so many as to be forced, by the weight and size,
to keep one foot apart from the other, the weight being
a serious inconvenience in walking. The gentlemen like Sambanza,
who wish to imitate their betters, do so in their walk;
so you see men, with only a few ounces of ornament on their legs,
strutting along as if they had double the number of pounds.
When I smiled at Sambanza's walk, the people remarked, "That is the way
in which they show off their lordship in these parts."
Manenko was quite decided in the adoption of the policy of friendship
with the Makololo which we recommended; and, by way of cementing the bond,
she and her counselors proposed that Kolimbota should take a wife among them.
By this expedient she hoped to secure his friendship,
and also accurate information as to the future intentions of the Makololo.
She thought that he would visit the Balonda more frequently afterward,
having the good excuse of going to see his wife; and the Makololo
would never, of course, kill the villagers among whom
so near a relative of one of their own children dwells.
Kolimbota, I found, thought favorably of the proposition,
and it afterward led to his desertion from us.
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