Mbia, Who Was A Bit
Of A Wag, Laughingly Exclaimed In Broken English, "Oh, Kebrabasa
Good, Very Good; No Let Shippee Up To Sekeletu, Too Muchee Work,
Cuttee Woodyee, Cuttee Woodyee:
Kebrabasa good." It is currently
reported, and commonly believed, that once upon a time a Portuguese
named Jose Pedra,
- By the natives called Nyamatimbira, - chief, or
capitao mor, of Zumbo, a man of large enterprise and small humanity,-
-being anxious to ascertain if Kebrabasa could be navigated, made two
slaves fast to a canoe, and launched it from Chicova into Kebrabasa,
in order to see if it would come out at the other end. As neither
slaves nor canoe ever appeared again, his Excellency concluded that
Kebrabasa was unnavigable. A trader had a large canoe swept away by
a sudden rise of the river, and it was found without damage below;
but the most satisfactory information was that of old Sandia, who
asserted that in flood all Kebrabasa became quite smooth, and he had
often seen it so.
We emerged from the thirty-five or forty miles of Kebrabasa hills
into the Chicova plains on the 7th of June, 1860, having made short
marches all the way. The cold nights caused some of our men to cough
badly, and colds in this country almost invariably become fever. The
Zambesi suddenly expands at Chicova, and assumes the size and
appearance it has at Tette. Near this point we found a large seam of
coal exposed in the left bank.
We met with native travellers occasionally.
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