I Saw Also About Here Some Wild Cotton,
Apparently Of Very Good Quality, But None Is Cultivated.
The Land Is So Fertile As To Produce Almost Any (Thing?) Without Much Trouble.
"At this village is a very large house, mud-built, with a court-yard.
I believe it to have
Been used as a barracoon for slaves,
several large cargoes having been exported from this river.
I proceeded up the river as far as its junction with the Quilimane River,
called `Boca do Rio', by my computation between 70 and 80 miles
from the entrance. The influence of the tides is felt about 25 or 30 miles
up the river. Above that, the stream, in the dry season,
runs from 1-1/2 to 2-1/2 miles an hour, but in the rains much stronger.
The banks of the river, for the first 30 miles, are generally thickly clothed
with trees, with occasional open glades. There are many huts and villages
on both sides, and a great deal of cultivation. At one village,
about 17 miles up on the eastern bank, and distinguished by
being surrounded by an immense number of bananas and plantain-trees,
a great quantity of excellent peas are cultivated; also cabbages,
tomatoes, onions, etc. Above this there are not many inhabitants
on the left or west bank, although it is much the finest country,
being higher, and abounding in cocoanut palms, the eastern bank being
sandy and barren. The reason is, that some years back the Landeens,
or Caffres, ravaged all this country, killing the men and taking the women
as slaves, but they have never crossed the river; hence the natives
are afraid to settle on the west bank, and the Portuguese owners
of the different `prasos' have virtually lost them. The banks of the river
continue mostly sandy, with few trees, except some cocoanut palms,
until the southern end of the large plantation of Nyangue,
formed by the river about 20 miles from Maruru. Here the country
is more populous and better cultivated, the natives a finer race, and the huts
larger and better constructed. Maruru belongs to Senor Asevedo,
of Quilimane, well known to all English officers on the east coast
for his hospitality.
"The climate here is much cooler than nearer the sea, and Asevedo
has successfully cultivated most European as well as tropical vegetables.
The sugar-cane thrives, as also coffee and cotton, and indigo is a weed.
Cattle here are beautiful, and some of them might show with credit in England.
The natives are intelligent, and under a good government this fine country
might become very valuable. Three miles from Maruru is Mesan,
a very pretty village among palm and mango trees. There is here a good house
belonging to a Senor Ferrao; close by is the canal (Mutu) of communication
between the Quilimane and Zambesi rivers, which in the rainy season
is navigable (?). I visited it in the month of October,
which is about the dryest time of the year; it was then a dry canal,
about 30 or 40 yards wide, overgrown with trees and grass,
and, at the bottom, at least 16 or 17 feet above the level of the Zambesi,
which was running beneath.
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