United States or Cocos Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The Banyamwezi beat off the Mazitu with their guns, while all the country people fled. The Banyamwezi are decidedly uglier than the Balonda and Baitawa: they eat no fish, though they come from the east side of Tanganyika, where fish are abundant and cheap; but though uglier, they have more of the sense of honour with traders than the aborigines. 29th June, 1868.
The inhabitants there extract a little salt from the sand when it is dry, and all the people of the adjacent country come to purchase it from them. This was the first salt we had met with since leaving Angola, for none is to be found in either the country of the Balonda or Barotse; but we heard of salt-pans about a fortnight west of Naliele, and I got a small supply from Mpololo while there.
The people of Cazembe are Balonda or Baloi, and his country has been termed Londa, Lunda, or Lui, by the Portuguese. It was always difficult to get our guides to move away from a place. With the authority of the chief, they felt as comfortable as king's messengers could, and were not disposed to forego the pleasure of living at free quarters.
On the 6th of January we reached the village of another female chief, named Nyamoana, who is said to be the mother of Manenko, and sister of Shinte or Kabompo, the greatest Balonda chief in this part of the country. Her people had but recently come to the present locality, and had erected only twenty huts.
In many cases, not referred to in this book, I feel more horror now in thinking on dangers I have run than I did at the time of their occurrence. When we reached the part of the river opposite to the village of Manenko, the first female chief whom we encountered, two of the people called Balunda, or Balonda, came to us in their little canoe.
We always deposited our fire-arms and spears outside a village before entering it, while the Balonda, on visiting us at our encampment, always came fully armed, until we ordered them either to lay down their weapons or be off. Next day we passed through a piece of forest so dense that no one could have penetrated it without an axe.
This proposition we afterward discovered was Kolimbota's own, as he had heard so much about the ferocity of the tribes through which we were to pass that he wished to save his skin. It will be seen farther on that he was the only one of our party who returned with a wound. We were particularly struck, in passing through the village, with the punctiliousness of manners shown by the Balonda.
It was placed in the shade of my tent, which was pitched under the thickest tree we could find. The sensation of cold, after the heat of the day, was very keen. The Balonda at this season never leave their fires till nine or ten in the morning. As the cold was so great here, it was probably frosty at Linyanti; I therefore feared to expose my young trees there.
Lerimo's party had taken some of this Masiko's subjects prisoners, and destroyed several villages of the Balonda, to whom we were going. This was in direct opposition to the policy of Sekeletu, who wished to be at peace with these northern tribes; and Pitsane, my head man, was the bearer of orders to Mpololo to furnish us with presents for the very chiefs they had attacked.
As soon as we got away from the track of the slave-traders, the more kindly spirit of the southern Balonda appeared, for an old man brought a large present of food from one of the villages, and volunteered to go as guide himself. The people, however, of the numerous villages which we passed always made efforts to detain us, that they might have a little trade in the way of furnishing our suppers.
Word Of The Day