Coming
From Many Different Tribes, All The Rays Of The Separate
Superstitions Converge Into A Focus At Tette, And Burn Out Common
Sense From The Minds Of The Mixed Breed.
They believe that many evil
spirits live in the air, the earth, and the water.
These invisible
malicious beings are thought to inflict much suffering on the human
race; but, as they have a weakness for beer and a craving for food,
they may be propitiated from time to time by offerings of meat and
drink. The serpent is an object of worship, and hideous little
images are hung in the huts of the sick and dying. The
uncontaminated Africans believe that Morungo, the Great Spirit who
formed all things, lives above the stars; but they never pray to him,
and know nothing of their relation to him, or of his interest in
them. The spirits of their departed ancestors are all good,
according to their ideas, and on special occasions aid them in their
enterprises. When a man has his hair cut, he is careful to burn it,
or bury it secretly, lest, falling into the hands of one who has an
evil eye, or is a witch, it should be used as a charm to afflict him
with headache. They believe, too, that they will live after the
death of the body, but do not know anything of the state of the
Barimo (gods, or departed spirits).
The mango-tree grows luxuriantly above Lupata, and furnishes a
grateful shade. Its delicious fruit is superior to that on the
coast. For weeks the natives who have charge of the mangoes live
entirely on the fruit, and, as some trees bear in November and some
in March, while the main crop comes between, fruit in abundance may
easily be obtained during four months of the year; but no native can
be induced to plant a mango. A wide-spread superstition has become
riveted in the native mind, that if any one plants this tree he will
soon die. The Makololo, like other natives, were very fond of the
fruit; but when told to take up some mango-stones, on their return,
and plant them in their own country - they too having become deeply
imbued with the belief that it was a suicidal act to do so - replied
"they did not wish to die too soon." There is also a superstition
even among the native Portuguese of Tette, that if a man plants
coffee he will never afterwards be happy: they drink it, however,
and seem the happier for it.
The Portuguese of Tette have many slaves, with all the usual vices of
their class, as theft, lying, and impurity. As a general rule the
real Portuguese are tolerably humane masters and rarely treat a slave
cruelly; this may be due as much to natural kindness of heart as to a
fear of losing the slaves by their running away. When they purchase
an adult slave they buy at the same time, if possible, all his
relations along with him. They thus contrive to secure him to his
new home by domestic ties. Running away then would be to forsake all
who hold a place in his heart, for the mere chance of acquiring a
freedom, which would probably be forfeited on his entrance into the
first native village, for the chief might, without compunction, again
sell him into slavery.
A rather singular case of voluntary slavery came to our knowledge: a
free black, an intelligent active young fellow, called Chibanti, who
had been our pilot on the river, told us that he had sold himself
into slavery. On asking why he had done this, he replied that he was
all alone in the world, had neither father nor mother, nor any one
else to give him water when sick, or food when hungry; so he sold
himself to Major Sicard, a notoriously kind master, whose slaves had
little to do, and plenty to eat. "And how much did you get for
yourself?" we asked. "Three thirty-yard pieces of cotton cloth," he
replied; "and I forthwith bought a man, a woman, and child, who cost
me two of the pieces, and I had one piece left." This, at all
events, showed a cool and calculating spirit; he afterwards bought
more slaves, and in two years owned a sufficient number to man one of
the large canoes. His master subsequently employed him in carrying
ivory to Quillimane, and gave him cloth to hire mariners for the
voyage; he took his own slaves, of course, and thus drove a thriving
business; and was fully convinced that he had made a good speculation
by the sale of himself, for had he been sick his master must have
supported him. Occasionally some of the free blacks become slaves
voluntarily by going through the simple but significant ceremony of
breaking a spear in the presence of their future master. A
Portuguese officer, since dead, persuaded one of the Makololo to
remain in Tette, instead of returning to his own country, and tried
also to induce him to break a spear before him, and thus acknowledge
himself his slave, but the man was too shrewd for this; he was a
great elephant doctor, who accompanied the hunters, told them when to
attack the huge beast, and gave them medicine to ensure success.
Unlike the real Portuguese, many of the half-castes are merciless
slave-holders; their brutal treatment of the wretched slaves is
notorious. What a humane native of Portugal once said of them is
appropriate if not true: "God made white men, and God made black
men, but the devil made half-castes."
The officers and merchants send parties of slaves under faithful
headmen to hunt elephants and to trade in ivory, providing them with
a certain quantity of cloth, beads, etc., and requiring so much ivory
in return. These slaves think that they have made a good thing of
it, when they kill an elephant near a village, as the natives give
them beer and meal in exchange for some of the elephant's meat, and
over every tusk that is brought there is expended a vast amount of
time, talk, and beer.
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