All Of The Faces,
As Livingstone Asserts, Appear Much Like Paintings Of Ancient Egyptians,
And Could Easily Be European Except For The Shading And The Slanted Eyes.
They Are All Handsome.
- A. L., 1997.
-
Chapter 23.
Make a Detour southward - Peculiarities of the Inhabitants -
Scarcity of Animals - Forests - Geological Structure of the Country -
Abundance and Cheapness of Food near the Chihombo - A Slave lost -
The Makololo Opinion of Slaveholders - Funeral Obsequies in Cabango -
Send a Sketch of the Country to Mr. Gabriel - Native Information
respecting the Kasai and Quango - The Trade with Luba -
Drainage of Londa - Report of Matiamvo's Country and Government -
Senhor Faria's Present to a Chief - The Balonda Mode of spending Time -
Faithless Guide - Makololo lament the Ignorance of the Balonda -
Eagerness of the Villagers for Trade - Civility of a Female Chief -
The Chief Bango and his People - Refuse to eat Beef - Ambition of Africans
to have a Village - Winters in the Interior - Spring at Kolobeng -
White Ants: "Never could desire to eat any thing better" -
Young Herbage and Animals - Valley of the Loembwe -
The white Man a Hobgoblin - Specimen of Quarreling -
Eager Desire for Calico - Want of Clothing at Kawawa's -
Funeral Observances - Agreeable Intercourse with Kawawa -
His impudent Demand - Unpleasant Parting - Kawawa tries to prevent
our crossing the River Kasai - Stratagem.
We made a little detour to the southward in order to get provisions
in a cheaper market. This led us along the rivulet called Tamba,
where we found the people, who had not been visited so frequently
by the slave-traders as the rest, rather timid and very civil.
It was agreeable to get again among the uncontaminated,
and to see the natives look at us without that air of superciliousness
which is so unpleasant and common in the beaten track.
The same olive color prevailed. They file their teeth to a point,
which makes the smile of the women frightful, as it reminds one
of the grin of an alligator. The inhabitants throughout this country
exhibit as great a variety of taste as appears on the surface of society
among ourselves. Many of the men are dandies; their shoulders are always wet
with the oil dropping from their lubricated hair, and every thing about them
is ornamented in one way or another. Some thrum a musical instrument
the livelong day, and, when they wake at night, proceed at once
to their musical performance. Many of these musicians are too poor
to have iron keys to their instrument, but make them of bamboo, and persevere,
though no one hears the music but themselves. Others try to appear warlike
by never going out of their huts except with a load of bows and arrows,
or a gun ornamented with a strip of hide for every animal they have shot;
and others never go any where without a canary in a cage. Ladies may be seen
carefully tending little lap-dogs, which are intended to be eaten.
Their villages are generally in forests, and composed of groups
of irregularly-planted brown huts, with banana and cotton trees,
and tobacco growing around.
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