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On the occasion of the death of a chief, a trader is liable to be robbed, for the people consider themselves not amenable to law until a new one is elected. We continued a very winding course, in order to avoid the chief Katolosa, who is said to levy large sums upon those who fall into his hands. One of our guides was a fine, tall young man, the very image of Ben Habib the Arab.
The names Monomoizes, spelled also Monemuiges and Monomuizes, and Monomotapistas, when applied to these tribes, are exactly the same as if we should call the Scotch the Lord Douglases. Motape was the chief of the Bambiri, a tribe of the Banyai, and is now represented in the person of Katolosa. He was probably a man of greater energy than his successor, yet only an insignificant chief.
Katolosa is "the Emperor Monomotapa" of history, but he is a chief of no great power, and acknowledges the supremacy of Nyatewe. The Portuguese formerly honored Monomotapa with a guard, to fire off numbers of guns on the occasion of any funeral, and he was also partially subsidized. The only evidence of greatness possessed by his successor is his having about a hundred wives.
We were obliged to give them two small tusks; for, had they told Katolosa of our supposed offense, we should, in all probability, have lost the whole. We then went through a very rough, stony country without any path. Being pretty well tired out in the evening of the 2d of March, I remained at about eight miles distance from Tete, Tette, or Nyungwe.
Having rendered Tete a ruin, Bonga carried off all the cattle and plunder to his father. News of this having been brought to the army before the stockade, a sudden panic dispersed the whole; and as the fugitives took roundabout ways in their flight, Katolosa, who had hitherto pretended to be friendly with the Portuguese, sent out his men to capture as many of them as they could.
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