THE ANGOLESE.
Westward of the country which has just been described is a large district that embraces a considerable portion of the coast, and extends far inward. This country is well known under the name of Angola. As this country has been held for several centuries by the Portuguese, who have extended their settlements for six or seven hundred miles into the interior, but few of the original manners and customs have survived, and even those have been modified by the contact with white settlers. As, however, Angola is a very important, as well as large country, a short account will be given of the natives before we proceed more northward.
The chiefs of the Angolese are elected, and the choice must be made from certain families. In one place there are three families from which the chief is chosen in rotation. The law of succession is rather remarkable, the eldest brother inheriting property in preference to the son; and if a married man dies, his children belong to his widow’s eldest brother, who not unfrequently converts them into property by selling them to the slave dealers. It is in this manner, as has been well remarked, that the slave trade is supplied, rather than by war.
The inhabitants of this land, although dark, are seldom if ever black, their color being brownish red, with a tinge of yellow; and, although they are so close to the country inhabited by the true negroes, they have but few of the negro traits. Their features are not those of the negro, the nose being rather aquiline, and broad at base, their hair woolly, but tolerably long and very abundant, and their lips moderately thick. The hands and feet are exquisitely small, and, as Mr. Reade observes, Angolese slaves afford a bold contrast with those who are brought from the Congo.
Of the women the same traveller writes in terms of considerable praise, as far as their personal appearance goes. There are girls in that country who have such soft dark eyes, such sweet smiles, and such graceful ways, that they involuntarily win a kind of love, only it is that sort of semi-love which is extended to a dog, a horse, or a bird, and has in it nothing of the intellect. They are gentle, and faithful, and loving in their own way; but, though they can inspire a passion, they cannot retain the love of an intellectual man.
As is the case with the Balonda, the Angolese live greatly on manioc roots, chiefly for the same reason as the Irish peasantry live so much on the potato, i. e. because its culture and cooking give very little trouble. The preparation of the soil and planting of the shrub are the work of slaves, the true Angolese having a very horror of hard work. Consequently the labor is very imperfectly performed, the ground being barely scratched by the double-handled hoe, which is used by dragging it along the ground rather than by striking it into the earth.
The manioc is, however, a far more useful plant than the potato, especially the “sweet” variety, which is free from the poisonous principle. It can be eaten raw, just as it comes out of the ground, or it can be roasted or boiled. Sometimes it is partially fermented, then dried and ground into meal, or reduced to powder by a rasp, mixed with sugar, and made into a sort of confectionery. The leaves can be boiled and eaten as a vegetable, or, if they be given to goats, the latter yield a bountiful supply of milk. The wood affords an excellent fuel, and, when burned, it furnishes a large quantity of potash. On the average, it takes about a year to come to perfection in Angola, and only requires to be weeded once during that time.
The meal or roots cannot be stored, as they are liable to the attacks of a weevil which quickly destroys them, and therefore another plan is followed. The root is scraped like horseradish, and laid on a cloth which is held over a vessel. Water is then poured on it, and the white shavings are well rubbed with the hands. All the starch-globules are thus washed out of their cells, and pass through the cloth into the vessel below together with the water. When this mixture has been allowed to stand for some time, the starchy matter collects in a sort of sediment, and the water is poured away. The sediment is then scraped out, and placed on an iron plate which is held over a fire. The gelatinous mass is then continually stirred with a stick, and by degrees it forms itself into little translucent globules, which are almost exactly identical with the tapioca of commerce. The advantage of converting the manioc-root into tapioca is, that in the latter state it is impervious to the destructive weevil.
Some parts of Angola are low, marshy, and fever-breeding, and even the natives feel the effects of the damp, hot, malarious climate. Of medicine, however, they have but little idea, their two principal remedies being cupping and charms. The former is a remedy which is singularly popular, and is conducted in much the same way throughout the whole of Africa south of the equator. The operator has three implements, namely, a small horn, a knife, and a piece of wax. The horn is cut quite level at the base, and great care is taken that the edge be perfectly smooth. The smaller end is perforated with a very small hole. This horn is generally tied to a string and hung round the neck of the owner, who is usually a professional physician. The knife is small, and shaped exactly like the little Bechuana knife shown at the [top of page 281].
When the cupping horn is to be used, the wide end is placed on the afflicted part, and pressed down tightly, while the mouth is applied to the small end, and the air exhausted. The operator continues to suck for some moments, and then removes the horn, and suddenly makes three or four gashes with the knife on the raised and reddened skin. The horn is again applied, and when the operator has sucked out the air as far as his lungs will allow him, he places with his tongue a small piece of wax on the end of the horn, introduces his finger into his mouth, presses the wax firmly on the little aperture so as to exclude the air, and then allows the horn to remain adherent by the pressure of the atmosphere. The blood of course runs into the horn, and in a short time coagulates into a flat circular cake. The wax is then removed from the end of the horn, the latter is taken off, the cake of blood put aside, and the process repeated until the operator and patient are satisfied.
Dr. Livingstone mentions a case in which this strange predilection for the cupping horn clearly hastened, even if it did not produce, the death of a child. The whole story is rather a singular one, and shows the state of religious, or rather superstitious, feeling among the native Angolese. It so happened that a Portuguese trader died in a village, and after his death the other traders met and disposed of his property among themselves, each man accounting for his portion to the relations of the deceased, who lived at Loanda, the principal town of Angola. The generality of the natives, not understanding the nature of written obligations, thought that the traders had simply sold the goods and appropriated the money.
Some time afterward the child of a man who had bought some of this property fell ill, and the mother sent for the diviner in order to find out the cause of its ailment. After throwing his magic dice, and working himself up to the proper pitch of ecstatic fury, the prophet announced that the child was being killed by the spirit of the deceased trader in revenge for his stolen property. The mother was quite satisfied with the revelation, and wanted to give the prophet a slave by way of a fee. The father, however, was less amenable, and, on learning the result of the investigation, he took a friend with him to the place where the diviner was still in his state of trance, and by the application of two sticks to his back restored him to his senses. Even after this the ignorant mother would not allow the child to be treated with European medicines, but insisted on cupping it on the cheek; and the consequence was, that in a short time the child died.
The Angolese are a marvellously superstitious people, and, so far from having lost any of their superstitions by four centuries of connection with the Portuguese, they seem rather to have infected their white visitors with them. Ordeals of several kinds are in great use among them, especially the poison ordeal, which has extended itself through so large a portion of Africa, and slays its thousands annually. One curious point in the Angolese ordeal is, that it is administered in one particular spot on the banks of the river Dua, and that persons who are accused of crime, especially of witchcraft, will travel hundreds of miles to the sacred spot, strong in their belief that the poison tree will do them no harm. It is hardly necessary to state that the guilt or innocence of the person on trial depends wholly on the caprice of the medicine man who prepares the poisonous draught, and that he may either weaken it or substitute another material without being discovered by these credulous people.
As, according to Balonda ideas, the spirits of the deceased are always with their friends on earth, partaking equally in their joys and sorrows, helping those whom they love, and thwarting those whom they hate, they are therefore supposed to share in an ethereal sort of way in the meals taken by their friends; and it follows that when a man denies himself food, he is not only starving himself, but afflicting the spirits of his ancestors. Sacrifices are a necessary result of this idea, as is the cooking and eating of the flesh by those who offer them.
Their theory of sickness is a very simple one. They fancy that if the spirits of the dead find that their living friends do not treat them properly, and give them plenty to eat and drink, the best thing to do is to take out of the world such useless allies, in order to make room for others who will treat them better. The same idea also runs into their propitiatory sacrifices. If one man kills another, the murderer offers sacrifices to his victim, thinking that if when he first finds himself a spirit, instead of a man, he is treated to an abundant feast, he will not harbor feelings of revenge against the man who sent him out of the world, and deprived him of all its joys and pleasures. It is said that in some parts of the country human sacrifices are used, a certain sect existing who kill men in order to offer their hearts to the spirits.
Marriages among the Angolese still retain some remnant of their original ceremonies. The bride is taken to a hut, anointed with various charmed preparations, and then left alone while prayers are offered for a happy marriage and plenty of male children, a large family of sons being one of the greatest blessings that can fall to the lot of an Angolese household. Daughters are comparatively despised, but a woman who has never presented her husband with children of either sex is looked upon with the greatest scorn and contempt. Her more fortunate companions are by no means slow in expressing their opinion of her, and in the wedding songs sung in honor of a bride are sure to introduce a line or two reflecting upon her uselessness, and hoping that the bride will not be so unprofitable a wife as to give neither sons nor daughters to her husband as a recompense for the money which he has paid for her. So bitter are these words, that the woman at whom they were aimed has been more than once known to rush off and destroy herself.
After several days of this performance, the bride is taken to another hut, clothed in all the finery that she possesses or can borrow for the occasion, led out in public, and acknowledged as a married woman. She then goes to her husband’s dwelling, but always has a hut to herself.
Into their funeral ceremonies the Angolese contrive to introduce many of their superstitions. Just before death the friends set up their wailing cry (which must be very consolatory to the dying person), and continue this outcry for a day or two almost without cessation, accompanying themselves with a peculiar musical instrument which produces tones of a similar character. For a day or two the survivors are employed in gathering materials for a grand feast, in which they expend so much of their property that they are often impoverished for years. They even keep pigs and other animals in case some of their friends might die, when they would be useful at the funeral. True to the idea that the spirit of the dead partakes of the pleasures of the living, they feast continually until all the food is expended, interposing their revelling with songs and dances. The usual drum beating goes on during the time, and scarcely one of the party is to be found sober. Indeed, a man who would voluntarily remain sober would be looked upon as despising the memory of the dead. Dr. Livingstone mentions that a native who appeared in a state of intoxication, and was blamed for it, remarked in a surprised tone, “Why, my mother is dead!”
They have a curious hankering after cross-roads as a place of interment, and although the Portuguese, the real masters of the land, have endeavored to abolish the custom, they have not yet succeeded in doing so, even though they inflict heavy fines on those who disobeyed them, and appointed places of public interment. Even when the interment of the body in the cross-road itself has been prevented, the natives have succeeded in digging the grave by the side of the path. On and around it they plant certain species of euphorbias, and on the grave they lay various articles, such as cooking vessels, water bottles, pipes, and arms. These, however, are all broken and useless, being thought equally serviceable to the dead as the perfect specimens, and affording no temptation to thieves.
A very remarkable and striking picture of the Angolese, their superstitions, and their country, is given by Dr. Livingstone in the following passage:—
“When the natives turn their eyes to the future world, they have a view cheerless enough of their own utter helplessness and hopelessness. They fancy themselves completely in the power of the disembodied spirits, and look upon the prospect of following them as the greatest of misfortunes. Hence they are constantly deprecating the wrath of departed souls, believing that, if they are appeased, there is no other cause of death but witchcraft, which may be averted by charms.
“The whole of the colored population of Angola are sunk in these gross superstitions, but have the opinion, notwithstanding, that they are wiser in these matters than their white neighbors. Each tribe has a consciousness of following its own best interests in the best way. They are by no means destitute of that self-esteem which is so common in other nations; yet they fear all manner of phantom, and have half-developed ideas and traditions of something or other, they know not what. The pleasures of animal life are ever present to their minds as the supreme good; and, but for the innumerable invisibilities, they might enjoy their luxurious climate as much as it is possible for man to do.
“I have often thought, in travelling through their land, that it presents pictures of beauty which angels might enjoy. How often have I beheld in still mornings scenes the very essence of beauty, and all bathed in a quiet air of delicious warmth! yet the occasional soft motion imparted a pleasing sensation of coolness, as of a fan. Green grassy meadows, the cattle feeding, the goats browsing, the kids skipping; the groups of herdboys with miniature bows, arrows, and spears; the women wending their way to the river, with water-pots poised jauntily on their heads; men sewing under the shady banians; and old gray-headed fathers sitting on the ground, with staff in hand, listening to the morning gossip, while others carry trees or branches to repair their hedges; and all this, flooded with the bright African sunshine, and the birds singing among the branches before the heat of the day has become intense, form pictures which can never be forgotten.”
CHAPTER XXXVII.
THE WAGOGO AND WANYAMUEZI.
THE MANY AND TRANSITORY TRIBES OF AFRICA — UGOGO AND THE PEOPLE — UNPLEASANT CHARACTER OF THE WAGOGO — THEFT AND EXTORTION — WAGOGO GREEDINESS — THE WANYAMUEZI OR WEEZEE TRIBE — THEIR VALUE AS GUIDES — DRESS OF THE MEN — “SAMBO” RINGS — WOMEN’S DRESS AND ORNAMENTS — HAIR-DRESSING — GENERAL CHARACTER OF THE WOMEN — WEEZEE ARCHITECTURE — USE OF THE DRUM — SALUTATION — SULTAN STIRABOUT — THE HUSBAND’S WELCOME — GAMES AND DANCES — SHAM FIGHTS — PITCH AND TOSS — NIGHT IN A WEEZEE VILLAGE — BREWING AND DRINKING POMBE — HARVEST SCENE — SUPERSTITIONS — FUNERALS.
We will now pass from the west to the east of Africa, and accompany Captains Speke and Grant in their journey through the extraordinary tribes that exist between Zanzibar and Northern Africa. It will be impossible to describe in detail the many tribes that inhabit this tract, or even to give the briefest account of them. We shall therefore select a few of the most important among them, and describe them as fully as our very limited space will permit.
Perhaps the reader may think it strange that we are lingering so long in this part of the world. The reason is, that Africa, southern and equatorial, is filled with a bewildering variety of singular tribes, each of which has manners and customs unique in themselves, and presents as great a contrast to its neighbors as if they were separated by seas or mountain ranges. Sometimes they merge into each other by indefinable gradations, but often the line of demarcation is boldly and sharply drawn, so that the tribe which inhabits one bank of a river is utterly unlike that which occupies the opposite bank, in appearance, in habits, and in language. In one case, for example, the people who live on one side of the river are remarkable for the scrupulous completeness with which both sexes are clad, while on the other side no clothing whatever is worn.
The same cause which has given us the knowledge of these remarkable tribes will inevitably be the precursor of their disappearance. The white man has set his foot on their soil, and from that moment may be dated their gradual but certain decadence. They have learned the value of fire-arms, and covet them beyond everything. Their chiefs have already abandoned the use of their native weapons, having been wealthy enough to purchase muskets from the white men, or powerful enough to extort them as presents. The example which they have set is sure to extend to the people, and a few years will therefore witness the entire abandonment of native-made weapons. With the weapons their mode of warfare will be changed, and in course of time the whole people will undergo such modifications that they will be an essentially different race. It is the object of this work to bring together, as far as possible in a limited space, the most remarkable of these perishing usages, and it is therefore necessary to expend the most space on the country that affords most of them.
The line that we now have to follow can be seen by referring to a map of Africa. We shall start from Zanzibar on the east coast, go westward and northward, passing by the Unyamuezi and Wahuma to the great N’yanza lakes. Here we shall come upon the track of Sir Samuel Baker, and shall then accompany him northward among the tribes which he visited.
Passing by a number of tribes which we cannot stop to investigate, we come upon the Wagogo, who inhabit Ugogo, a district about lat. 4° S. and long. 36° E. Here I may mention that, although the language of some of these tribes is so different that the people cannot understand each other, in most of them the prefix “Wa” indicates plurality, like the word “men” in English. Thus the people of Ugogo are the Wagogo, and the inhabitants of Unyamuezi are the Wanyamuezi, pronounced, for brevity’s sake, Weezee. An individual of the Wagogo is called Mgogo.
The Wagogo are a wild set of people, such as might be expected from the country in which they live. Their color is reddish-brown, with a tinge of black; and when the skin happens to be clean, it is said to look like a very ripe plum. They are scanty dressers, wearing little except a cloth of some kind round the waist; but they are exceedingly fond of ornaments, by means of which they generally contrive to make themselves as ugly as possible. Their principal ornament is the tubular end of a gourd, which is thrust through the ear; but they also decorate their heads with hanks of bark fibre, which they twist among their thick woolly hair, and which have a most absurd appearance when the wearer is running or leaping. Sometimes they weave strings of beads into the hair in a similar manner, or fasten an ostrich feather upon their heads.
They are not a warlike people, but, like others who are not remarkable for courage, they always go armed; a Mgogo never walking without his spear and shield, and perhaps a short club, also to be used as a missile. The shield is oblong, and made of leather, and the spear has nothing remarkable about it; and, as Captain Speke remarks, these weapons are carried more for show than for use.
They are not a pleasant people, being avaricious, intrusive, and inquisitive, ingrained liars, and sure to bully if they think they can do so with safety. If travellers pass through their country, they are annoying beyond endurance, jeering at them with words and insolent gestures, intruding themselves among the party, and turning over everything that they can reach, and sometimes even forcing themselves into the tents. Consequently the travellers never enter the villages, but encamp at some distance from them, under the shelter of the wide-spreading “gouty-limbed trees” that are found in this country, and surround their camp with a strong hedge of thorns, which the naked Mgogo does not choose to encounter.
Covetous even beyond the ordinary avarice of African tribes, the Wagogo seize every opportunity of fleecing travellers who come into their territory. Beside the usual tax or “hongo,” which is demanded for permission to pass through the country, they demand all sorts of presents, or rather bribes. When one of Captain Speke’s porters happened to break a bow by accident, the owner immediately claimed as compensation something of ten times its value.
Magomba, the chief, proved himself an adept at extortion. First he sent a very polite message, requesting Captain Speke to reside in his own house, but this flattering though treacherous proposal was at once declined. In the first place, the houses of this part of the country are small and inconvenient, being nothing more than mud huts with flat-topped roofs, this kind of architecture being called by the name of “tembe.” In the next place, the chief’s object was evidently to isolate the leader of the expedition from his companions, and so to have a hold upon him. This he could more easily do, as the villages are strongly walled, so that a traveller who is once decoyed inside them could not escape without submitting to the terms of the inhabitants. Unlike the villages of the Southern Africans, which are invariably circular, these are invariably oblong, and both the walls and the houses are made of mud.
Next day Magomba had drunk so much pombé that he was quite unfit for business, but on the following day the hongo was settled, through the chief’s prime minister, who straightway did a little business on his own account by presenting a small quantity of food, and asking for an adequate return, which, of course, meant one of twenty times its value. Having secured this, he proceeded to further extortion by accusing Captain Grant of having shot a lizard on a stone which he was pleased to call sacred. So, too, none of them would give any information without being paid for it. And, because they thought that their extortion was not sufficiently successful, they revenged themselves by telling the native porters such horrifying tales of the countries which they were about to visit and the cruelty of the white men, that the porters were frightened, and ran away, some forgetting to put down their loads. These tactics were repeated at every village near which the party had to pass, and at one place the chief threatened to attack Captain Speke’s party, and at the same time sent word to all the porters that they had better escape, or they would be killed. Half of them did escape, taking with them the goods which would have been due to them as payment; and, as appeared afterward, the rascally Wagogo had arranged that they should do so, and then they would go shares in the plunder.
They were so greedy, that they not only refused to sell provisions except at an exorbitant rate, but, when the leaders of the expedition shot game to supply food for their men, the Wagogo flocked to the spot in multitudes, each man with his arms, and did their best to carry off the meat before the rightful owners could reach it. Once, when they were sadly in want of food, Captain Speke went at night in search of game, and shot a rhinoceros. By earliest dawn he gave notice to his men that there was plenty of meat for them.
“We had all now to hurry back to the carcass before the Wagogo could find it; but, though this precaution was quickly taken, still, before the tough skin of the beast could be cut through, the Wagogo began assembling like vultures, and fighting with my men. A more savage, filthy, disgusting, but at the same time grotesque, scene than that which followed cannot be described. All fell to work with swords, spears, knives, and hatchets, cutting and slashing, thumping and bawling, fighting and tearing, up to their knees in filth and blood in the middle of the carcass. When a tempting morsel fell to the possession of any one, a stronger neighbor would seize and bear off the prize in triumph. All right was now a matter of pure might, and lucky it was that it did not end in a fight between our men and the villagers. These might be afterward seen, covered with blood, scampering home each one with his spoil—a piece of tripe, or liver, or lights, or whatever else it might have been his fortune to get off with.” The artist has represented [this scene] on the next page.
It might be imagined that the travellers were only too glad to be fairly out of the dominions of this tribe, who had contrived to cheat and rob them in every way, and had moreover, through sheer spite and covetousness, frightened away more than a hundred porters who had been engaged to carry the vast quantities of goods with which the traveller must bribe the chiefs of the different places through which he passes.