Being Now Supplied With A Good New Tent Made By My Friends
On Board The Philomel, We Left Loanda On
The 20th of September, 1854,
and passed round by sea to the mouth of the River Bengo.
Ascending this river,
We went through the district in which stand
the ruins of the convent of St. Antonio; thence into Icollo i Bengo,
which contains a population of 6530 blacks, 172 mulattoes, and 11 whites,
and is so named from having been the residence of a former native king.
The proportion of slaves is only 3.38 per cent. of the inhabitants.
The commandant of this place, Laurence Jose Marquis,
is a frank old soldier and a most hospitable man; he is one of the few
who secure the universal approbation of their fellow-men for stern,
unflinching honesty, and has risen from the ranks to be a major in the army.
We were accompanied thus far by our generous host, Edmund Gabriel, Esq., who,
by his unwearied attentions to myself, and liberality in supporting my men,
had become endeared to all our hearts. My men were strongly impressed
with a sense of his goodness, and often spoke of him in terms of admiration
all the way to Linyanti.
While here we visited a large sugar manufactory belonging to a lady,
Donna Anna da Sousa. The flat alluvial lands on the banks
of the Senza or Bengo are well adapted for raising sugar-cane,
and this lady had a surprising number of slaves, but somehow the establishment
was far from being in a flourishing condition.
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