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. From them we learned that Kolimbota, one of our party, who had been in the habit of visiting these parts, was believed by the Balonda to have acted as a guide to the marauders under Lerimo, whose captives we were now returning. They very naturally suspected this, from the facility with which their villages had been found, and, as they had since removed them to some distance from the river, they were unwilling to lead us to their places of concealment. We were in bad repute, but, having a captive boy and girl to show in evidence of Sekeletu and ourselves not being partakers in the guilt of inferior men, I could freely express my desire that all should live in peace. They evidently felt that I ought to have taught the Makololo first, before coming to them, for they remarked that what I advanced was very good, but guilt lay at the door of the Makololo for disturbing the previously existing peace. They then went away to report us to Manenko.
When the strangers visited us again in the evening, they were accompanied by a number of the people of an Ambonda chief named Sekelenke. The Ambonda live far to the N.W.; their language, the Bonda, is the common dialect in Angola. Sekelenke had fled, and was now living with his village as a vassal of Masiko. As notices of such men will perhaps convey the best idea of the state of the inhabitants to the reader, I shall hereafter allude to the conduct of Sekelenke, whom I at present only introduce. Sekelenke had gone with his villagers to hunt elephants on the right bank of the Leeba, and was now on his way back to Masiko. He sent me a dish of boiled zebra's flesh, and a request that I should lend him a canoe to ferry his wives and family across the river to the bank on which we were encamped. Many of Sekelenke's people came to salute the first white man they ever had an opportunity of seeing; but Sekelenke himself did not come near. We heard he was offended with some of his people for letting me know he was among the company. He said that I should be displeased with him for not coming and making some present. This was the only instance in which I was shunned in this quarter.
As it would have been impolitic to pass Manenko, or any chief, without at least showing so much respect as to call and explain the objects of our passing through the country, we waited two entire days for the return of the messengers to Manenko; and as I could not hurry matters, I went into the adjacent country to search for meat for the camp.
The country is furnished largely with forest, having occasionally open lawns covered with grass, not in tufts as in the south, but so closely planted that one can not see the soil. We came upon a man and his two wives and children, burning coarse rushes and the stalks of tsitla, growing in a brackish marsh, in order to extract a kind of salt from the ashes. They make a funnel of branches of trees, and line it with grass rope, twisted round until it is, as it were, a beehive-roof inverted. The ashes are put into water, in a calabash, and then it is allowed to percolate through the small hole in the bottom and through the grass. When this water is evaporated in the sun, it yields sufficient salt to form a relish with food. The women and children fled with precipitation, but we sat down at a distance, and allowed the man time to gain courage enough to speak. He, however, trembled excessively at the apparition before him; but when we explained that our object was to hunt game, and not men, he became calm, and called back his wives. We soon afterward came to another party on the same errand with ourselves. The man had a bow about six feet long, and iron-headed arrows about thirty inches in length; he had also wooden arrows neatly barbed, to shoot in cases where he might not be quite certain of recovering them again. We soon afterward got a zebra, and gave our hunting acquaintances such a liberal share that we soon became friends. All whom we saw that day then came with us to the encampment to beg a little meat; and as they have so little salt, I have no doubt they felt grateful for what we gave.
Sekelenke and his people, twenty-four in number, defiled past our camp carrying large bundles of dried elephants' meat. Most of them came to say good-by, and Sekelenke himself sent to say that he had gone to visit a wife living in the village of Manenko. It was a mere African manoeuvre to gain information, and not commit himself to either one line of action or another with respect to our visit. As he was probably in the party before us, I replied that it was all right, and when my people came up from Masiko I would go to my wife too. Another zebra came to our camp, and, as we had friends near, it was shot. It was the 'Equus montanus', though the country is perfectly flat, and was finely marked down to the feet, as all the zebras are in these parts.
To our first message, offering a visit of explanation to Manenko, we got an answer, with a basket of manioc roots, that we must remain where we were till she should visit us. Having waited two days already for her, other messengers arrived with orders for me to come to her. After four days of rains and negotiation, I declined going at all, and proceeded up the river to the small stream Makondo (lat. 13d 23' 12" S.), which enters the Leeba from the east, and is between twenty and thirty yards broad.
JANUARY 1ST, 1854. We had heavy rains almost every day; indeed, the rainy season had fairly set in. Baskets of the purple fruit called mawa were frequently brought to us by the villagers; not for sale, but from a belief that their chiefs would be pleased to hear that they had treated us well; we gave them pieces of meat in return.
When crossing at the confluence of the Leeba and Makondo, one of my men picked up a bit of a steel watch-chain of English manufacture, and we were informed that this was the spot where the Mambari cross in coming to Masiko. Their visits explain why Sekelenke kept his tusks so carefully. These Mambari are very enterprising merchants: when they mean to trade with a town, they deliberately begin the affair by building huts, as if they knew that little business could be transacted without a liberal allowance of time for palaver. They bring Manchester goods into the heart of Africa; these cotton prints look so wonderful that the Makololo could not believe them to be the work of mortal hands. On questioning the Mambari they were answered that English manufactures came out of the sea, and beads were gathered on its shore. To Africans our cotton mills are fairy dreams. "How can the irons spin, weave, and print so beautifully?" Our country is like what Taprobane was to our ancestors—a strange realm of light, whence came the diamond, muslin, and peacocks; an attempt at explanation of our manufactures usually elicits the expression, "Truly ye are gods!"
When about to leave the Makondo, one of my men had dreamed that Mosantu was shut up a prisoner in a stockade: this dream depressed the spirits of the whole party, and when I came out of my little tent in the morning, they were sitting the pictures of abject sorrow. I asked if we were to be guided by dreams, or by the authority I derived from Sekeletu, and ordered them to load the boats at once; they seemed ashamed to confess their fears; the Makololo picked up courage and upbraided the others for having such superstitious views, and said this was always their way; if even a certain bird called to them, they would turn back from an enterprise, saying it was unlucky. They entered the canoes at last, and were the better of a little scolding for being inclined to put dreams before authority. It rained all the morning, but about eleven we reached the village of Sheakondo, on a small stream named Lonkonye. We sent a message to the head man, who soon appeared with two wives, bearing handsome presents of manioc: Sheakondo could speak the language of the Barotse well, and seemed awestruck when told some of the "words of God". He manifested no fear, always spoke frankly, and when he made an asseveration, did so by simply pointing up to the sky above him. The Balonda cultivate the manioc or cassava extensively; also dura, ground-nuts, beans, maize, sweet potatoes, and yams, here called "lekoto", but as yet we see only the outlying villages.
The people who came with Sheakondo to our bivouac had their teeth filed to a point by way of beautifying them, though those which were left untouched were always the whitest; they are generally tattooed in various parts, but chiefly on the abdomen: the skin is raised in small elevated cicatrices, each nearly half an inch long and a quarter of an inch in diameter, so that a number of them may constitute a star, or other device. The dark color of the skin prevents any coloring matter being deposited in these figures, but they love much to have the whole surface of their bodies anointed with a comfortable varnish of oil. In their unassisted state they depend on supplies of oil from the Palma Christi, or castor-oil plant, or from various other oliferous seeds, but they are all excessively fond of clarified butter or ox fat. Sheakondo's old wife presented some manioc roots, and then politely requested to be anointed with butter: as I had been bountifully supplied by the Makololo, I gave her as much as would suffice, and as they have little clothing, I can readily believe that she felt her comfort greatly enhanced thereby.