We Arrived At Katosa's Village On The 15th October, And Found About
Thirty Young Men And Boys In Slave-Sticks.
They had been bought by
other agents of the Arab slavers, still on the east side of the
Shire.
They were resting in the village, and their owners soon
removed them. The weight of the goree seemed very annoying when they
tried to sleep. This taming instrument is kept on, until the party
has crossed several rivers and all hope of escape has vanished from
the captive's mind.
On explaining to Katosa the injury he was doing in selling his people
as slaves, he assured us that those whom we had seen belonged to the
Arabs, and added that he had far too few people already. He said he
had been living in peace at the lakelet Pamalombe; that the Ajawa, or
Machinga, under Kainka and Karamba, and a body of Babisa, under
Maonga, had induced him to ferry them over the Shire; that they had
lived for a considerable time at his expense, and at last stole his
sheep, which induced him to make his escape to the place where he now
dwelt, and in this flight he had lost many of his people. His
account of the usual conduct of the Ajawa quite agrees with what
these people have narrated themselves, and gives but a low idea of
their moral tone. They have repeatedly broken all the laws of
hospitality by living for months on the bounty of the Manganja, and
then, by a sudden uprising, overcoming their hosts, and killing or
chasing them out of their inheritances.
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