The glare of sunlight from which we had come
enabled him, in diplomatic fashion, to have a good view of us before
our eyes became enough accustomed to the dark inside to see him. He
has a Jewish cast of countenance, or rather the ancient Assyrian
face, as seen in the monuments brought to the British Museum by Mr.
Layard. This form of face is very common in this country, and leads
to the belief that the true type of the negro is not that met on the
West Coast, from which most people have derived their ideas of the
African.
Chinsamba had many Abisa or Babisa in his stockade, and it was
chiefly by the help of their muskets that he had repulsed the Mazitu:
these Babisa are great travellers and traders.
We liked Chinsamba very well, and found that he was decidedly opposed
to our risking our lives by going further to the N.W. The Mazitu
were believed to occupy all the hills in that direction, so we spent
the 4th of September with him.
It is rather a minute thing to mention, and it will only be
understood by those who have children of their own, but the cries of
the little ones, in their infant sorrows, are the same in tone, at
different ages, here as all over the world.
