THE BADÉMA TRIBE.
There is still left a small fragment of one of the many African tribes which are rapidly expiring. These people are called Badéma, and from their ingenuity seem to deserve a better fate. They are careful husbandmen, and cultivate small quantities of tobacco, maize, and cotton in the hollows of the valleys, where sufficient moisture lingers to support vegetation. They are clever sportsmen, and make great use of the net, as well on the land as in the water. For fishing they have a kind of casting net, and when they go out to catch zebras, antelopes, and other animals, they do so by stretching nets across the narrow outlets of ravines, and then driving the game into them. The nets are made of baobab bark, and are very strong.
They have a singularly ingenious mode of preserving their corn. Like many other failing tribes, they are much persecuted by their stronger neighbors, who are apt to make raids upon them, and carry off all their property, the chief part of which consists of corn. Consequently they are obliged to conceal their stores in the hills, and only keep a small portion in their huts, just sufficient for the day’s consumption. But the mice and monkeys are quite as fond of corn as their human enemies, and would soon destroy all their stores, had not the men a plan by which they can be preserved. The Badéma have found out a tree, the bark of which is hateful both to the mice and the monkeys. Accordingly they strip off the bark, which is of a very bitter character, roll it up into cylindrical vessels, and in these vessels they keep their corn safely in caves and crevices among the rocks.
Of course, when their enemies come upon them, they always deny that they have any food except that which is in their huts, and when Dr. Livingstone came among them for the first time they made the stereotyped denial, stating that they had been robbed only a few weeks before.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
THE BALONDO OR BALONDA AND THE ANGOLESE.
GENERAL APPEARANCE — MODE OF GOVERNMENT — WOMAN’S DRESS — MANENKO AND HER STRANGE COSTUME — FASHIONS IN HAIR-DRESSING — COSTUME OF THE MEN — THEIR ORNAMENTS — PECULIAR GAIT — MODE OF SALUTATION — CURIOSITY — MILDNESS OF TEMPERAMENT — AN ATTEMPT AT EXTORTION — A SCENE AT COURT — BALONDA MUSIC — MANENKO IN COMMAND — KATEMA AND HIS BEARER — LOVE OF CATTLE — FOOD OF THE BALONDA — FISH-CATCHING — BALONDA ARCHITECTURE — CEMENTING FRIENDSHIP — RELIGION AND IDOLS — A WILD LEGEND — FUNERAL CUSTOMS — THE ANGOLESE — THEIR CHARACTER — AGRICULTURE — THE MANIOC, AND ITS USES — MEDICINES AND CUPPING — SUPERSTITIONS — MARRIAGES AND FUNERALS — DR. LIVINGSTONE’S SUMMARY.
We now come to a rather important tribe that lives very close to the equator. This is called the Balondo or Balonda tribe, i. e. the people who inhabit Londa-land, a very large district on the western side of Africa. A great number of small tribes inhabit this country, but, as they really are offshoots of the one tribe, we will treat of them all under the common name of Balondo.
The chief ruler, or king, of the Balonda tribes is Matiamvo, a name which is hereditary, like that of the Czar or Pharaoh. He has absolute power of life and death, and one of them had a way of proving this authority by occasionally running about the town and beheading every one whom he met, until sometimes quite a heap of human heads was collected. He said that his people were too numerous to be prosperous, and so he took this simple method of diminishing their numbers. There seems to be no doubt that he was insane, and his people thought so too; but their reverence for his office was so great that he was allowed to pursue his mad course without check, and at length died peaceably, instead of being murdered, as might have been expected.
He was a great slave-dealer, and used to conduct the transaction in a manner remarkable for its simplicity. When a slave-merchant came to his town, he took all his visitor’s property, and kept him as a guest for a week or ten days. After that time, having shown his hospitality, he sent out a party of armed men against some populous village, killed the headman, and gave the rest of the inhabitants to the slave merchant in payment for his goods. Thus he enriched his treasury and thinned his population by the same act. Indeed, he seemed always to look upon villages as property which could be realized at any time, and had, besides, the advantage of steadily increasing in value. If he heard of or saw anything which he desired exceedingly, and the owner declined to part with it, he would destroy a whole village, and offer the plunder to the owner of the coveted property.
Still, under this régime, the people lead, as a general rule, tolerably happy and contented lives. They are not subjected to the same despotism as the tribes of the Southern districts, and, indeed, often refuse to obey the orders of the chief. Once, when Katema sent to the Balobale, a sub-tribe under his protection, and ordered them to furnish men to carry Dr. Livingstone’s goods, they flatly refused to do so, in spite of Katema’s threat that, if they did not obey, he would deprive them of his countenance, and send them back to their former oppressors. The fact is, each of the chiefs is anxious to collect round himself as many people as possible, in order to swell his own importance, and he does not like to do anything that might drive them away from him into the ranks of some rival chief. Dr. Livingstone remarks, that this disobedience is the more remarkable, as it occurs in a country where the slave-trade is in full force, and where people may be kidnapped and sold under any pretext that may happen to occur to the chief.
As is frequently the case with African tribes, there is considerable variety of color among the Balondo, some being of a notably pale chocolate hue, while others are so black as to rival the negro in darkness of complexion. They appear to be a rather pleasing set of men, tainted, as must be the case, with the ordinary vices of savage life, but not morose, cruel, or treacherous, as is too often the case. The women appear to be almost exceptionally lively, being full of animal spirits, and spending all their leisure time, which seems to be considerable, in chattering, weddings, funerals, and similar amusements. Dr. Livingstone offers a suggestion that this flow of spirits may be one reason why they are so indestructible a race, and thinks that their total want of care is caused by the fatalism of their religious theories, such as they are. Indeed, he draws rather a curious conclusion from their happy and cheerful mode of life, considering that it would be a difficulty in the way of a missionary, though why a lively disposition and Christianity should be opposed to each other is not easy to see.
One woman, named Manenko, afforded a curious example of mixed energy, liveliness, and authority. She was a chief, and, though married, retained the command in her own hands. When she first visited Dr. Livingstone, she was a remarkably tall and fine woman of twenty or thereabouts, and rather astonished her guest by appearing before him in a bright coat of red ochre, and nothing else, except some charms hung round her neck. This absence of clothing was entirely a voluntary act on her part, as, being a chief, she might have had any amount of clothing that she liked; but she evidently thought that her dignity required her to outdo the generality of Balondo ladies in the scantiness of apparel which distinguishes them.
In one part of Londa-land the women are almost wholly without clothes, caring nothing for garments, except those of European manufacture, which they wear with much pride. Even in this latter case the raiment is not worn so much as a covering to the body as a kind of ornament which shows the wealth of the wearer, for the women will purchase calico and other stuffs at extravagant prices. They were willing to give twenty pounds’ weight of meal and a fowl for a little strip of calico barely two feet in length, and, having put it on, were quite charmed with their new dress.
The fact is, they have never been accustomed to dress, and “are all face,” the weather having no more effect on their bodies than it does on our faces. Even the very babies are deprived of the warm fur-clad wrapper in which the generality of African mothers carry them, and the infant is as exposed to the weather as its mother. The Londa mother carries her child in a very simple manner. She plaits a bark belt, some four inches or so in width, and hangs it over one shoulder and under the other, like the sash of a light infantry officer. The child is partly seated on its mother’s hip, and partly supported by the belt, which, as is evident, does not afford the least protection against the weather. They even sleep in the same state of nudity, keeping up a fire at night, which they say is their clothing. The women tried very hard to move the compassionate feelings of their white visitors by holding up their little naked babies, and begging for clothes; but it was clear that the real destination of such clothes was for ornaments for themselves.
As is the case with several other tribes which care little for clothes, they decorate their heads with the greatest care, weaving their hair into a variety of patterns, that must cost infinite trouble to make, and scarcely less to preserve. They often employ the “buffalo-horn” pattern, which has already been mentioned, sometimes working their hair into two horns, and sometimes into one, which projects over the forehead. Some of them divide the hair into a number of cords or plaits, and allow them to hang all round the face. The most singular method of dressing the hair is one which is positively startling at first sight, on account of the curious resemblance which it bears to the “nimbus” with which the heads of saints are conventionally surrounded. The hair is dressed in plaits, as has already been mentioned, but, instead of being allowed to hang down, each plait or strand is drawn out in a radiating fashion, and the ends are fastened to a hoop of light wood. When this is done, the hoop itself represents the nimbus, and the strands of hair the radiating beams of light. (See [next page].)
The features of the Balondo women are pleasing enough, and in some cases are even tolerably regular. The teeth are allowed to retain their original form and whiteness; and it is a pity that so many good countenances are disfigured by the custom of thrusting pieces of reed through the septum of the nose.
The dress of the Balondo men is more worthy of the name than that of the women, as it consists of a girdle round the waist, with a softly-dressed skin of a jackal in front, and a similar skin behind. Dr. Livingstone relates an anecdote concerning this dress, which shows how arbitrary is the feeling of decency and its opposite. He had with him a number of Makololo men, whose dress is similar to that of many other tribes, and consists merely of a piece of soft hide fastened to the girdle in front, brought under the legs, and tucked into the girdle behind. Now this dress is much more worthy of the name than the double skin of the Balonda. Yet the Balonda girls, themselves in a state of almost complete nudity, were very much shocked when they found that the Makololo men wore no back-apron. Whenever a Makololo man happened to turn his back upon the women and girls, they laughed and jeered at him to such an extent that he was made quite wretched by their scorn. Had they been even moderately clad, such behavior might seem excusable, but, when it is remembered that the dress of the despised visitor would have furnished costumes to four or five of the women who were laughing at him, we can but wonder at the singular hold which fashion takes of the human mind.
(1.) THE MARIMBA OR AFRICAN PIANO.
(See [page 375].)
(2.) HEADDRESSES.
(See [page 370].)
The Balondo men are as fond of ornaments as their wives, and, as with them, the decorations chiefly belong to the head and the feet. In some places they have a fashion of dressing their hair into a conical form, similar to that which has been already mentioned; while a man who is fond of dress will generally show his foppery by twisting his beard into three distinct plaits. Some of the Balondo men have a considerable quantity of thick woolly hair, and dress it in a singular fashion. They begin by parting it down the middle, and then forming the hair of each side into two thick rolls, which pass between the ears and fall down as far as the shoulders. The rest of the hair is gathered up into a bundle, and hangs on the back of the neck.
Whenever they can afford it, the Balondo men will carry one of the large knives which are so prevalent in this part of the continent. Throughout the whole of Western Africa there is one type of knife, which undergoes various modifications according to the particular district in which it is made, and this type is as characteristic of Western Africa as the Bechuana knife is of the southern parts. Their curious form is almost identical with that of weapons taken from tumuli in Europe. The sheath is always very wide, and is made with great care, being mostly ornamental as well as useful.
Heavy rings of copper and other metals are as much in vogue as among the Damaras; only the men prefer to wear them on their own limbs, instead of handing them over to their wives. As wealth is mostly carried on the person in this country, a rich Balondo man will have six or seven great copper rings encircling his ankles, each ring weighing two pounds or so. The gait of a rich man is therefore singularly ungraceful, the feet being planted widely apart, so that the massive rings should not come in contact. The peculiar gait which is caused by the presence of the treasured rings is much admired among the Balondo, and is studiously imitated by those who have no need to use it. A young man, for example, who is only worth half a dozen rings weighing half an ounce or so each, will strut about with his feet wide apart, as if he could hardly walk for the weight of his anklets.
The ornament which is most prized is made from a large species of shell belonging to the genus Conus. The greater part of the shell is chipped away, and only the flat and spiral base is left. This is pierced in the middle, and a string is passed through the middle, so that it can be hung round the neck. Dr. Livingstone tells an anecdote which shows the estimation in which this ornament is held. Just before his departure the king, Shinte, came into his tent, and passed a considerable time in examining his books, watch, and other curiosities. At last he carefully closed the door of the tent, so that none of his people might see the extravagance of which he was about to be guilty, and drew one of these shells from his clothing, hung it round his host’s neck, with the words, “There, now you have a proof of my friendship.” These shells are used, like stars and crosses in England, as emblems of rank; and they have besides a heavy intrinsic value, costing the king at the rate of a slave for two, or a large elephant’s tusk for five.
The very fact that they possess insignia of rank shows that they must possess some degree of civilization; and this is also shown by the manner in which inferiors are bound to salute those above them. If a man of low rank should meet a superior, the former immediately drops on his knees, picks up a little dirt, rubs it on his arms and chest, and then claps his hands until the great man has passed. So punctilious are they in their manner, that when Sambanza, the husband of Manenko, was making a speech to the people of a village, he interspersed his discourse with frequent salutations, although he was a man of consequence himself, being the husband of the chief.
There are many gradations in the mode of saluting. Great chiefs go through the movements of rubbing the sand, but they only make a pretence of picking up sand. If a man desires to be very polite indeed, he carries with him some white ashes or powdered pipe-clay in a piece of skin, and, after kneeling in the usual manner, rubs it on his chest and arms, the white powder being an ocular proof that the salutation has been properly conducted. He then claps his hands, stoops forward, lays first one cheek and then the other on the ground, and continues his clapping for some little time. Sometimes, instead of clapping his hands, he drums with his elbows against his ribs.
On the whole, those travellers who have passed through Londa seem to be pleased with the character of the inhabitants. Dr. Livingstone appears to have had but little trouble with them, except when resisting the extortionate demands which they, like other tribes, were apt to make for leave of passage through their country. He writes:—
“One could detect, in passing, the variety of character found among the owners of gardens and villages. Some villages were the picture of neatness. We entered others enveloped in a wilderness of weeds, so high that, when sitting on an ox-back in the middle of the village, we could only see the tops of the huts. If we entered at mid-day, the owners would come lazily forth, pipe in hand, and leisurely puff away in dreamy indifference. In some villages weeds were not allowed to grow; cotton, tobacco, and different plants used as relishes, are planted round the huts; fowls are kept in cages; and the gardens present the pleasant spectacle of different kinds of grain and pulse at various periods of their growth. I sometimes admired the one class, and at times wished I could have taken the world easy, like the other.
“Every village swarms with children, who turn out to see the white man pass, and run along with strange cries and antics; some run up trees to get a good view—all are agile climbers through Londa. At friendly villages they have scampered alongside our party for miles at a time. We usually made a little hedge round our sheds; crowds of women came to the entrance of it, with children on their backs, and pipes in their mouths, gazing at us for hours. The men, rather than disturb them, crawled through a hole in the hedge; and it was common to hear a man in running off say to them, “I am going to tell my mamma to come and see the white man’s oxen.”
According to the same authority, the Balonda do not appear to be a very quarrelsome race, generally restricting themselves to the tongue as a weapon, and seldom resorting to anything more actively offensive. The only occasion on which he saw a real quarrel take place was rather a curious one. An old woman had been steadily abusing a young man for an hour or two, with that singular fluency of invective with which those women seem to be gifted. He endured it patiently for some time, but at last uttered an exclamation of anger. On which another man sprang forward, and angrily demanded why the other had cursed his mother. They immediately closed with each other, and a scuffle commenced, in the course of which they contrived to tear off the whole of each other’s clothing. The man who began the assault then picked up his clothes and ran away, threatening to bring his gun, but he did not return, and the old woman proceeded with her abuse of the remaining combatant. In their quarrels the Balonda make plenty of noise, but after a while they suddenly cease from their mutual invective, and conclude the dispute with a hearty laugh.
Once a most flagrant attempt at extortion was made by Kawawa, a Balonda chief who had a very bad character, and was in disfavor with Matiamvo, the supreme chief of the Balonda. He sent a body of men to a ferry which they had to cross, in order to prevent the boatman taking them over the river. The canoes were removed; and as the river was at least a hundred yards wide, and very deep, Kawawa thought he had the strangers at his mercy, and that if the cart, the ox, the gun, the powder, and the slave, which he required, were not forthcoming, he could keep the strangers until they were forced to comply with his demands. However, during the night Dr. Livingstone swam to the place where the canoes were hidden, ferried the whole party across, replaced the canoe, together with some beads as payment for its use, and quietly swam to the side, on which their party were now safely landed. Kawawa had no idea that any of the travellers could swim, and the whole party were greatly amused at the astonishment which they knew he must feel when he found the travellers vanished and the canoes still in their place of concealment.
Some of the Balonda have a very clever but rather mean method of extorting money from travellers. When they ferry a party over the river, they purposely drop or leave in a canoe a knife or some other object of value. They then watch to see if any one will pick it up, and, if so, seize their victim and accuse him of the theft. They always manage to do so just before the headman of the party has been ferried across, and threaten to retain him as a hostage until their demand be paid. Dr. Livingstone once fell a victim to this trick, a lad belonging to his party having picked up a knife which was thrown down as a bait by one of the rascally boatmen. As the lad happened to possess one of those precious shells which have been mentioned, he was forced to surrender it to secure his liberty. Such conduct was, however, unusual with the Balonda, and the two great chiefs, Shinte and Katema, behaved with the greatest kindness to the travellers. The former chief gave them a grand reception, which exhibited many of the manners and customs of the people.
The royal throne was placed under the shade of a spreading banian tree, and was covered with a leopard skin. The chief had disfigured himself with a checked jacket and a green baize kilt; but, besides these portions of civilized costume, he wore a multitude of native ornaments, the most conspicuous being the number of copper and iron rings round his arms and ankles, and a sort of bead helmet adorned with a large plume of feathers. His three pages were close to him, and behind him sat a number of women headed by his chief wife, who was distinguished from the others by a cap of scarlet material.
In many other parts of Africa the women would have been rigidly excluded from a public ceremony, and at the best might have been permitted to see it from a distance; but among the Balonda the women take their own part in such meetings: and on the present occasion Shinto often turned and spoke to them, as if asking their opinion.
Manenko’s husband, Sambanza, introduced the party, and did so in the usual manner, by saluting with ashes. After him the various subdivisions of the tribe came forward in their order, headed by its chief man, who carried ashes with him, and saluted the king on behalf of his company. Then came the soldiers, who dashed forward at the white visitor in their usually impetuous manner, shaking their spears in his face, brandishing their shields, and making all kinds of menacing gestures, which in this country is their usual way of doing honor to a visitor. They then turned and saluted the king, and took their places.
Next came the speeches, Sambanza marching about before Shinte, and announcing in a stentorian voice and with measured accents the whole history of the white men and their reasons for visiting the country. His argument for giving the travellers leave to pass through the territory was rather an odd one. The white man certainly said that he had come for the purpose of opening the country for trade, making peace among the various tribes, and teaching them a better religion than their own. Perhaps he was telling lies; for it was not easy to believe that a white man who had such treasures at home would take the trouble of coming out of the sea where he lived for the mere purpose of conferring benefits on those whom he had never seen. On the whole, they rather thought he was not speaking the truth. But still, though he had plenty of fire-arms, he had not attacked the Balonda; and it was perhaps more consistent with Shinte’s character as a wise and humane chief, that he should receive the white men kindly, and allow them to pass on.
Between the speeches the women filled up the time by chanting a wild and plaintive melody; and that they were allowed to take more than a passive part in the proceedings was evident from the frequency with which they applauded the various speeches. Music was also employed at the reception, the instruments being the marimba, which has already been mentioned, and drums. These latter instruments are carved from solid blocks of wood, cut into hollow cylinders, the ends of which are covered with antelope skin, and tightly fastened by a row of small wooden pegs. There is no method of bracing the skins such as we use with our drums, and when the drum-heads become slack they are tightened by being held to the fire. These drums are played with the hand, and not with sticks.
The most curious part of these drums is the use of a small square hole in the side, which seems to serve the same purpose as the percussion hole in the European instrument. Instead, however, of being left open, it is closed with a piece of spider’s web, which allows the needful escape of air, while it seems to have a resonant effect. The web which is used for this purpose is taken from the egg-case of a large species of spider. It is of a yellow color, rather larger than a crown piece in diameter, and is of wonderful toughness and elasticity. The custom of using spider’s web in this manner prevails through a very large portion of Africa, and is even found in those parts of Western Africa which have introduced many European instruments among those which belonged to them before they had made acquaintance with civilization.
The drums and marimba are played together; and on this occasion the performers walked round and round the enclosure, producing music which was really not unpleasant even to European ears. The marimba is found, with various modifications, throughout the whole of this part of Africa. Generally the framework is straight, and in that case the instrument is mostly placed on the ground, and the musician plays it while in a sitting or kneeling posture. But in some places, especially where it is to be played by the musician on the march, the framework is curved like the tire of a cart-wheel, so that, when the instrument is suspended in front of the performer, he can reach the highest and lowest keys without difficulty. The [illustration] on page 371 represents one of the straight-framed marimbas, and is drawn from a specimen in Colonel Lane Fox’s collection.
After this interview Shinte always behaved very kindly to the whole party, and, as we have already seen, invested Dr. Livingtone with the precious shell ornament before his departure.
As to Shinte’s niece, Manenko, the female chief, she was a woman who really deserved her rank, from her bold and energetic character. She insisted on conducting the party in her own manner; and when they set out, she headed the expedition in person. It happened to be a singularly unpleasant one, the rain falling in torrents, and yet this very energetic lady marched on at a pace that could be equalled by few of the men, and without the slightest protection from the weather, save the coat of red grease and a charmed necklace. When asked why she did not wear clothes, she said that a chief ought to despise such luxuries, and ought to set an example of fortitude to the rest of the tribe. Nearly all the members of the expedition complained of cold, wet, and hunger, but this indefatigable lady pressed on in the very lightest marching order, and not until they were all thoroughly wearied would she consent to halt for the night. Her husband, Sambanza, had to march in her train, accompanied by a man who had instructions to beat a drum incessantly, which he did until the perpetual rain soaked the skin-heads so completely that they would not produce a sound. Sambanza had then to chant all kinds of invocations to the rain, which he did, but without any particular effect.
She knew well what was her dignity, and never allowed it to be encroached upon. On one occasion Dr. Livingstone had presented an ox to Shinte. Manenko heard of it, and was extremely angry that such a gift should have been made. She said that, as she was the chief of the party who had brought the white men, the ox was hers, and not theirs, as long as she was in command. So she sent for the ox straightway, had it slaughtered by her own men, and then sent Shinte a leg. The latter chief seemed to think that she was justified in what she had done, took the leg, and said nothing about it.
Yet she did not forget that, although she was a chief, she was a woman, and ought therefore to perform a woman’s duties. When the party stopped for the night in some village, Manenko was accustomed to go to the huts and ask for some maize, which she ground and prepared with her own hands and brought to Dr. Livingstone, as he could not eat the ordinary country meal without being ill afterward. She was also careful to inform him of the proper mode of approaching a Balonda town or village. It is bad manners to pass on and enter a town without having first sent notice to the headman. As soon as a traveller comes within sight of the houses, he ought to halt, and send forward a messenger to state his name, and ask for permission to enter. The headman or chief then comes out, meets the stranger under a tree, just as Shinte received Dr. Livingstone, giving him a welcome, and appointing him a place where he may sleep. Before he learned this piece of etiquette, several villages had been much alarmed by the unannounced arrival of the visitors, who were in consequence looked upon with fear and suspicion.
Afterward, when they came to visit the great chief Katema, they found him quite as friendly as Shinte had been. He received them much after the same manner, being seated, and having around him a number of armed men or guards, and about thirty women behind him. In going to or coming from the place of council, he rode on the shoulders of a man appointed for the purpose, and who, through dint of long practice, performed his task with apparent ease, though he was slightly made, and Katema was a tall and powerful man. He had a great idea of his own dignity, and made a speech in which he compared himself with Matiamvo, saying that he was the great Moéne, or lord, the fellow of Matiamvo.
He was very proud of a small herd of cattle, about thirty in number, mostly white in color, and as active as antelopes. He had bred them all himself, but had no idea of utilizing them, and was quite delighted when told that they could be milked, and the milk used for food. It is strange that the Balonda are not a more pastoral people, as the country is admirably adapted for the nurture of cattle, and all those which were possessed by Katema, or even by Matiamvo himself, were in splendid condition. So wild were Katema’s cattle, that when the chief had presented the party with a cow, they were obliged to stalk and shoot it, as if it had been a buffalo. The native who shot the cow being a bad marksman, the cow was only wounded, and dashed off into the forest, together with the rest of the herd. Even the herdsman was afraid to go among them, and, after two days’ hunting, the wounded cow was at last killed by another ball.
The Balonda are not only fond of cattle, but they do their best to improve the breed. When a number of them went with Dr. Livingstone into Angola, they expressed much contemptuous wonder at the neglect both of land and of domesticated animals. They themselves are always on the look-out for better specimens than their own, and even took the trouble of carrying some large fowls all the way from Angola to Shinte’s village. When they saw that even the Portuguese settlers slaughtered little cows and heifer calves, and made no use of the milk, they at once set the white men down as an inferior race. When they heard that the flour used by these same settlers was nearly all imported from a foreign country, they were astonished at the neglect of a land so suited for agriculture as Angola. “These know nothing but buying and selling; they are not men,” was the verdict given by the so called savages.
The food of the Balonda is mostly of a vegetable character, and consists in a great measure of the manioc, or cassava, which grows in great abundance. There are two varieties of this plant, namely, the sweet and the bitter, i. e. the poisonous. The latter, however, is the quicker of growth, and consequently is chiefly cultivated. In order to prepare it for consumption, it is steeped in water for four days, when it becomes partially rotten, the skin comes off easily, and the poisonous matter is easily extracted. It is then dried in the sun, and can be pounded into a sort of meal.
When this meal is cooked, it is simply stirred into boiling water, one man holding the vessel and putting in the meal, while the other stirs it with all his might. The natives like this simple diet very much, but to an European it is simply detestable. It has no flavor except that which arises from partial decomposition, and it looks exactly like ordinary starch when ready for the laundress. It has but little nutritive power, and however much a man may contrive to eat, he is as hungry two hours afterward as if he had fasted. Dr. Livingstone compares it in appearance, taste, and odor, to potato starch made from diseased tubers. Moreover, owing to the mode of preparing it, the cooking is exceedingly imperfect, and, in consequence, its effects upon ordinary European digestions may be imagined.
The manioc plant is largely cultivated, and requires but little labor, the first planting involving nearly all the trouble. In the low-lying valleys the earth is dug with the curious Balonda hoe, which has two handles and one blade, and is scraped into parallel beds, about three feet wide and one foot in height, much resembling those in which asparagus is planted in England. In these beds pieces of the manioc stalk are planted at four feet apart. In order to save space, ground-nuts, beans, or other plants are sown between the beds, and, after the crop is gathered, the ground is cleared of weeds, and the manioc is left to nurture itself. It is fit for eating in a year or eighteen months, according to the character of the soil; but there is no necessity for digging it at once, as it may be left in the ground for three years before it becomes dry and bitter. When a root is dug, the woman cuts off two or three pieces of the stalk, puts them in the hole which she has made, and thus a new crop is begun. Not only the root is edible, but also the leaves, which are boiled and cooked as vegetables.
The Balonda seldom can obtain meat, and even Shinte himself, great chief as he was, had to ask for an ox, saying that his mouth was bitter for the want of meat. The reader may remember that when the ox in question was given, he was very thankful for the single leg which Manenko allowed him to receive. The people are not so fastidious in their food as many other tribes, and they are not above eating mice and other small animals with their tasteless porridge. They also eat fowls and eggs, and are fond of fish, which they catch in a very ingenious manner.
When the floods are out, many fish, especially the silurus, or mosala, as the natives call it, spread themselves over the land. Just before the waters retire, the Balonda construct a number of earthen banks across the outlets, leaving only small apertures for the water to pass through. In these apertures they fix creels or baskets, so made that the fish are forced to enter them as they follow the retreating waters, but, once in, they cannot get out again. Sometimes, instead of earthen walls, they plant rows of mats stretched between sticks, which answer the same purpose.
They also use fish traps very like our own lobster pots, and place a bait inside in order to attract the fish. Hooks are also employed; and in some places they descend to the practice of poisoning the water, by which means they destroy every fish, small and great, that comes within range of the deadly juice. The fish when taken are cleaned, split open, and dried in the smoke, so that they can be kept for a considerable time.
Like other Africans, the Balonda make great quantities of beer, which has more a stupefying than an intoxicating character, those who drink it habitually being often seen lying on their faces fast asleep. A more intoxicating drink is a kind of mead which they make, and of which some of them are as fond as the old Ossianic heroes. Shinte had a great idea of the medicinal properties of this mead, and recommended it to Dr. Livingstone when he was very ill with a fever: “Drink plenty of mead,” said he, “and it will drive the fever out.” Probably on account of its value as a febrifuge, Shinte took plenty of his own prescription.
They have a most elaborate code of etiquette in eating. They will not partake of food which has been cooked by strangers, neither will they eat it except when alone. If a party of Balonda are travelling with men of other tribes, they always go aside to cook their food, and then come back, clap their hands, and return thanks to the leader of the party. Each hut has always its own fire, and, instead of kindling it at the chief’s fire, as is the custom with the Damaras, they always light it at once with fire produced by friction.
So careful are the Balonda in this respect, that when Dr. Livingstone killed an ox, and offered some of the cooked meat to his party, the Balonda would not take it, in spite of their fondness for meat, and the very few chances which they have of obtaining it. They did, however, accept some of the raw meat, which they took away and cooked after their own fashion. One of them was almost absurd in the many little fashions which he followed and probably invented. When the meat was offered to him, he, would not take it himself, as it was below his dignity to carry meat. Accordingly he marched home in state, with a servant behind him carrying a few ounces of meat on a platter. Neither would he sit on the grass beside Dr. Livingstone. “He had never sat on the ground during the late Matiamvo’s reign, and was not going to degrade himself at his time of life.” So he seated himself on a log of wood, and was happy at his untarnished dignity.
One of the little sub-tribes, an offshoot of the Balonda, was remarkable for never eating beef on principle, saying that cattle are like human beings, and live at home like men. (There are other tribes who will not keep cattle, because, as they rightly say, the oxen bring enemies and war upon them. But they are always glad to eat beef when they can get it.) This tribe seems to be unique in its abstinence. Although they have this idea about cattle, they will eat without compunction the flesh of most wild animals, and in many cases display great ingenuity in hunting them. They stalk the animals through the long grass and brushwood, disguising themselves by wearing a cap made of the skin taken from the head of an antelope, to which the horns are still attached. When the animal which they are pursuing begins to be alarmed at the rustling of the boughs or shaking of the grass, they only thrust the horned mask into view, and move it about as if it were the head of a veritable antelope. This device quiets suspicion, and so the hunter proceeds until he is near enough to deliver his arrow. Some of these hunters prefer the head and neck of the jabiru, or great African crane.
As far as is known, the Balonda are not a warlike people, though they are in the habit of carrying arms, and have a very formidable look. Their weapons are short knife-like swords, shields, and bows and arrows, the latter being iron headed. The shields are made of reeds plaited firmly together. They are square or rather oblong, in form, measuring about five feet in length and three in width.
The architecture of the Balonda is simple, but ingenious. Every house is surrounded with a palisade which to all appearance has no door, and is always kept closed, so that a stranger may walk round and round it, and never find the entrance. In one part of the palisade the stakes are not fastened to each other, but two or three are merely stuck into their holes in the ground. When the inhabitants of the huts wish to enter or leave their dwellings, they simply pull up two or three stakes, squeeze themselves through the aperture, and replace them, so that no sign of a doorway is left. The reader may perhaps remember that the little wooden bird-cages in which canaries are brought to England are opened and closed in exactly the same manner, some movable bars supplying the place of a door.
Sometimes they vary the material of their fences, and make them of tall and comparatively slight rods fastened tightly together. Shinte’s palace was formed after this manner, and the interior space was decorated with clumps of trees which had been planted for the sake of the shade which they afforded. That these trees had really been planted, and not merely left standing, was evident from the fact that several young trees were seen recently set, with a quantity of grass twisted round their stems to protect them against the sun. Even the corners of the streets were planted with sugar-canes and bananas, so that the social system of the Balonda seems to be of rather a high order. One petty chief, called Mozinkwa, had made the hedge of his enclosure of green banian branches which had taken root, and so formed a living hedge.
It is a pity that so much care and skill should be so often thrown away. As the traveller passes through the Londa districts he often sees deserted houses, and even villages. The fact is, that either the husband or the chief wife has died, and the invariable custom is to desert the locality, and never to revisit it except to make offerings to the dead. Thus it happens that permanent localities are impossible, because the death of a chief’s wife would cause the whole village to be deserted, just as is the case with a house when an ordinary man dies. This very house and garden underwent the usual lot, for Mozinkwa lost his favorite wife, and in a few months house, garden, and hedges had all gone to ruin.
The Balonda have a most remarkable custom of cementing friendship. When two men agree to be special friends, they go through a singular ceremony. The men sit opposite each other with clasped hands, and by the side of each is a vessel of beer. Slight cuts are then made on the clasped hands, on the pit of the stomach, on the right cheek, and on the forehead. The point of a grass blade is then pressed against each of these cuts, so as to take up a little of the blood, and each man washes the grass blade in his own beer-vessel. The vessels are then exchanged and the contents drunk, so that each imbibes the blood of the other. They are then considered as blood relations, and are bound to assist each other in every possible manner. While the beer is being drunk, the friends of each of the men beat on the ground with clubs, and bawl out certain sentences as ratification of the treaty. It is thought correct for all the friends of each party to the contract to drink a little of the beer. This ceremony is called “kasendi.” After the ceremony has been completed, gifts are exchanged, and both parties always give their most precious possessions.
Dr. Livingstone once became related to a young woman in rather a curious manner. She had a tumor in her arm, and asked him to remove it. As he was doing so, a little blood spirted from one of the small arteries and entered his eye. As he was wiping it out, she hailed him as a blood relation, and said that whenever he passed through the country he was to send word to her, that she might wait upon him, and cook for him. Men of different tribes often go through this ceremony, and on the present occasion all Dr. Livingstone’s men, whether they were Batoka, Makololo, or of other tribes, became Molekanes, or friends, to the Balonda.
As to their religious belief, it is but confused and hazy, still it exercises a kind of influence over them. They have a tolerably clear idea of a Supreme Being, whom they call by different names according to their dialect. The Balonda use the word Zambi, but Morimo is one name which is understood through a very large tract of country. The Balonda believe that Zambi rules over all other spirits and minor deities just as their king Matiamvo rules over the greater and lesser chiefs. When they undergo the poison ordeal, which is used as much among them as in other tribes, they hold up their hands to heaven, and thus appeal to the Great Spirit to judge according to right.
Among the Balonda we come for the first time among idols or fetishes, whichever may be the correct title. One form of idol is very common in Balonda villages, and is called by the name of a lion, though a stranger uninitiated in its mysteries would certainly take it for a crocodile, or at all events a lizard of some kind. It is a long cylindrical roll of grass plastered over with clay. One end represents the head, and is accordingly furnished with a mouth, and a couple of cowrie shells by way of eyes. The other end tapers gradually into a tail, and the whole is supported on four short straight legs. The native modeller seems to have a misgiving that the imitation is not quite so close as might be wished, and so sticks in the neck a number of hairs from an elephant’s tail, which are supposed to represent the mane.
These singular idols are to be seen in most Balonda villages. They are supposed to represent the deities who have dominion over disease; and when any inhabitant of the village is ill, his friends go to the lion idol, and pray all night before it, beating their drums, and producing that amount of noise which seems to be an essential accompaniment of religious rites among Africans. Some idols may be perhaps more properly called teraphim, as by their means the medicine men foretell future events. These idols generally rest on a horizontal beam fastened to two uprights—a custom which is followed in Dahomé when a human sacrifice has been made. The medicine men tell their clients that by their ministrations they can force the teraphim to speak, and that thus they are acquainted with the future. They are chiefly brought into requisition in war-time, when they are supposed to give notice of the enemy’s approach.
These idols take various shapes. Sometimes they are intended to represent certain animals, and sometimes are fashioned into the rude semblance of the human head. When the superstitious native does not care to take the trouble of carving or modelling an idol, he takes a crooked stick, fixes it in the ground, rubs it with some strange compound, and so his idol is completed. Trees are pressed into the service of the heathen worshipper. Offerings of maize or manioc root are laid on the branches, and incisions are made in the bark, some being mere knife-cuts, and others rude outlines of the human face. Sticks, too, are thrown on the ground in heaps, and each traveller that passes by is supposed to throw at least one stick on the heap.
Sometimes little models of huts are made, and in them are placed pots of medicine; and in one instance a small farmhouse was seen, and in it was the skull of an ox by way of an idol. The offerings which are made are generally some article of food; and some of the Balonda are so fearful of offending the denizens of the unseen world, that whenever they receive a present, they always offer a portion of it to the spirits of their dead relations.
One curious legend was told to Dr. Livingstone, and is worthy of mention, because it bears a resemblance to the old mythological story of Latona. There is a certain lake called in Londa-land Dilolo, respecting which the following story was told to the white visitors:—
“A female chief, called Moéne (lord) Monenga, came one evening to the village of Mosogo, a man who lived in the vicinity, but who had gone to hunt with his dogs. She asked for a supply of food, and Mosogo’s wife gave her a sufficient quantity. Proceeding to another village, standing on the spot now occupied by the water, she preferred the same demand, and was not only refused, but, when she uttered a threat for their niggardliness, was taunted with the question, ‘What could she do though she were thus treated?’
“In order to show what she could do, she began a song in slow time, and uttered her own name, ‘Monenga-wo-o.’ As she prolonged the last note, the village, people, fowls, and dogs sank into the space now called Dilolo. When Kasimakàte, the headman of the village, came home and found out the catastrophe, he cast himself into the lake, and is supposed to be in it still. The name is taken from ‘ilólo,’ despair, because this man gave up all hope when his family was destroyed. Monenga was put to death.”
The Balonda are certainly possessed of a greater sense of religion than is the case with tribes which have been described. They occasionally exhibit a feeling of reverence, which implies a religious turn of mind, though the object toward which it may manifest itself be an unworthy one. During Dr. Livingstone’s march through the Londa country the party was accompanied by a medicine man belonging to the tribe which was ruled by Manenko. The wizard in question carried his sacred implements in a basket, and was very reverential in his manner toward them. When near these sacred objects, he kept silence as far as possible, and, if he were forced to speak, never raised his voice above a whisper. Once, when a Batoka man happened to speak in his usual loud tones when close to the basket, the doctor administered a sharp reproof, his anxious glances at the basket showing that he was really in earnest. It so happened that another female chief, called Nyamoana, was of the party, and, when they had to cross a stream that passed by her own village, she would not venture to do so until the doctor had waved his charms over her, and she had further fortified herself by taking some in her hands, and hanging others round her neck.
As the Balonda believe in a Supreme Being, it is evident that they also believe in the immortality of the human spirit. Here their belief has a sort of consistency, and opposes a curious obstacle to the efforts of missionaries; even Dr. Livingstone being unable to make any real impression on them. They fancy that when a Balonda man dies, he may perhaps take the form of some animal, or he may assume his place among the Barimo, or inferior deities, this word being merely the plural form of Morimo. In either case the enfranchised spirit still belongs to earth, and has no aspirations for a higher state of existence.
Nor can the missionary make any impression on their minds with regard to the ultimate destiny of human souls. They admit the existence of the Supreme Being; they see no objection to the doctrine that the Maker of mankind took on Himself the humanity which He had created; they say that they always have believed that man lives after the death of the body; and apparently afford a good basis for instruction in the Christian religion. But, although the teachers can advance thus far, they are suddenly checked by the old objection that white and black men are totally different, and that, although the spirits of deceased white men may go into a mysterious and incomprehensible heaven, the deceased Balonda prefer to remain near their villages which were familiar to them in life, and to assist those who have succeeded them in their duties. This idea may probably account for the habit of deserting their houses after the death of any of the family.
During the funeral ceremonies a perpetual and deafening clamor is kept up, the popular notion seeming to be, that the more noise they can make, the greater honor is due to the deceased. Wailing is carried on with loud piercing cries, drums are beaten, and, if fire-arms have been introduced among them, guns are fired. These drums are not beaten at random, but with regular measured beats. They are played all night long, and their sound has been compared to the regular beating of a paddle-wheel engine. Oxen are slaughtered and the flesh cooked for a feast, and great quantities of beer and mead are drunk. The cost of a funeral in these parts is therefore very great, and it is thought a point of honor to expend as much wealth as can be got together for the purpose.
The religious element is represented by a kind of idol or figure covered with feathers, which is carried about during some parts of the ceremony; and in some places a man, in a strange dress, covered with feathers, dances with the mourners all night, and retires to the feast in the early morning. He is supposed to be the representative of the Barimo, or spirits.
The position of the grave is usually marked with certain objects. One of these graves was covered with a huge cone of sticks laid together like the roof of a hut, and a palisade was erected round the cone. There was an opening on one side, in which was placed an ugly idol, and a number of bits of cloth and strings of beads were hung around.