How I Found Livingstone Travels, Adventures And Discoveries In Central Africa Including Four Months Residence With Dr. Livingstone By Sir Henry M. Stanley
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These Two Extensive Countries, Rua And Manyuema,
Are Populated By True Heathens, Governed, Not As The Sovereignties
Of Karagwah, Urundi, And Uganda, By Despotic Kings, But Each
Village By Its Own Sultan Or Lord.
Thirty miles outside of their
own immediate settlements, the most intelligent of these small
chiefs seem to know nothing.
Thirty miles from the Lualaba, there
were but few people who had ever heard of the great river. Such
ignorance among the natives of their own country naturally
increased the labours of Livingstone. Compared with these, all
tribes and nations in Africa with whom Livingstone came in contact
may be deemed civilized, yet, in the arts of home manufacture,
these wild people of Manyuema were far superior to any he had
seen. Where other tribes and nations contented themselves with
hides and skins of animals thrown negligently over their shoulders,
the people of Manyuema manufactured a cloth from fine grass, which
may favorably compare with the finest grass cloth of India. They
also know the art of dy/e/ing them in various colours - black, yellow,
and purple. The Wangwana, or freed-men of Zanzibar, struck with
the beauty of the fabric, eagerly exchange their cotton cloths
for fine grass cloth; and on almost every black man from Manyuema
I have seen this native cloth converted into elegantly made damirs
(Arabic) - short jackets. These countries are also very rich in ivory.
The fever for going to Manyuema to exchange tawdry beads for its
precious tusks is of the same kind as that which impelled men to go
to the gulches and placers of California, Colorado, Montana, and
Idaho; after nuggets to Australia, and diamonds to Cape Colony.
Manyuema is at present the El Dorado of the Arab and the Wamrima
tribes. It is only about four years since that the first Arab
returned from Manyuema, with such wealth of ivory, and reports
about the fabulous quantities found there, that ever since the
old beaten tracks of Karagwah, Uganda, Ufipa, and Marungu have
been comparatively deserted. The people of Manyuema, ignorant
of the value of the precious article, reared their huts upon
ivory stanchions. Ivory pillars were common sights in Manyuema,
and, hearing of these, one can no longer, wonder at the ivory
palace of Solomon. For generations they have used ivory tusks
as door-posts and supports to the eaves, until they had become
perfectly rotten and worthless. But the advent of the Arabs
soon taught them the value of the article. It has now risen
considerably in price, though still fabulously cheap. At
Zanzibar the value of ivory per frasilah of 35 lbs. weight
is from $50 to $60, according to its quality. In Unyanyembe
it is about $1-10 per pound, but in Manyuema, it may be
purchased for from half a cent to 14 cent's worth of copper
per pound of ivory. The Arabs, however, have the knack of
spoiling markets by their rapacity and cruelty. With muskets,
a small party of Arabs is invincible against such people as
those of Manyuema, who, until lately, never heard the sound of
a gun.
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