There Is Not A Single Inscription On Stone Visible In Massangano.
If Destroyed To-Morrow, No One Could Tell Where It And Most Portuguese
Interior Villages Stood, Any More Than We Can Do Those Of The Balonda.
During the occupation of this town the Coanza was used
for the purpose of navigation, but their vessels were so frequently plundered
by their Dutch neighbors that, when they regained the good port of Loanda,
they no longer made use of the river.
We remained here four days,
in hopes of obtaining an observation for the longitude,
but at this season of the year the sky is almost constantly overcast
by a thick canopy of clouds of a milk-and-water hue; this continues
until the rainy season (which was now close at hand) commences.
The lands on the north side of the Coanza belong to the Quisamas (Kisamas),
an independent tribe, which the Portuguese have not been able to subdue.
The few who came under my observation possessed much of the Bushman
or Hottentot feature, and were dressed in strips of soft bark
hanging from the waist to the knee. They deal largely in salt,
which their country produces in great abundance. It is brought
in crystals of about 12 inches long and 1-1/2 in diameter.
This is hawked about every where in Angola, and, next to calico,
is the most common medium of barter. The Kisama are brave;
and when the Portuguese army followed them into their forests,
they reduced the invaders to extremity by tapping all the reservoirs of water,
which were no other than the enormous baobabs of the country hollowed
into cisterns.
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