In personal appearance the Babemba are very handsome, many of them having heads as finely formed as the majority of Europeans. They are distinguished by small hands and feet, and have none of the gross ugliness of the Congo tribes of West Africa, who are with most persons the typical negroes.
Dr. Livingstone’s observations led him to adopt the opinion which Winwood Reade formed,—that the ancient Egyptian is the type of the negro race, and not the awkward forms and hideous features of the West Coast tribes. It is probable that this beautiful and romantic region was the real home of the negro. The women excited the admiration of the Arabs by the charms of their full forms and delicate features. The only drawback was the result of a fashion among them, as is often the case among their civilized sisters: they file their teeth to points, and this “makes their smile like that of a crocodile.”
CHAPTER CLXIII.
AFRICA—Continued.
THE MANYUEMA COUNTRY.
LIVINGSTONE’S DEPARTURE FROM UJIJI — LORD OF THE PARROT — GRAPHIC PICTURE — MOENÉKUSS AND HIS SONS — FEAR OF THE MANYUEMA — THEIR HORRIBLE DEEDS — REMARKABLE BEAUTY OF THE COUNTRY — AGRICULTURE OF THE PEOPLE — THEIR VILLAGES — DWELLINGS — THE WOMEN CLEVER TRADERS — THEIR VALUE AS WIVES — RITE OF CIRCUMCISION — LARGE POPULATION — THE CHITOKA — VIVID DESCRIPTION OF MARKET-DAY — DREADFUL MASSACRE.
The Manyuema country, for which Livingstone set out on the 12th of July, 1869, from Ujiji, the Arab settlement on Lake Tanganyika, had till then never been visited by any white man. It will be seen that its people differ from any of the tribes on the East Coast. Thinking that this portion of Africa, hitherto untravelled by foot of civilized man, must abound in ivory, the Arab merchants were desirous of securing the rich stores awaiting the earliest adventurers. Livingstone accompanied the first of these bands of Ujijan traders who entered this new field. The distance from Lake Tanganyika to Bambarré or Moenékuss (the paramount chief of the Manyuema) is about forty days’ travel.
The light-gray parrot with red tail which is so common in this region, and which is called Kuss or Koos, gives this chief his name, which means Lord of the Parrot. The pronunciation by the Manyuema is Monanjoose. This district is in the large bend of the Lualaba River, which is much larger here than at Mpwéto’s, near Moero Lake.
The course taken by the great explorer led over a very uneven country. It was up and down hills perpetually; now into dells filled with enormous trees, some of which were twenty feet in circumference and sixty or seventy feet to the first branches; then, rising upon some commanding height, the vast valley Jorumba lay before him with all its remarkable beauty. There were many villages dotted over the slopes of these mountains. One had been destroyed, showing by the hard clay walls and square form of the houses that it belonged to the Manyuema. A graphic picture of the country and its scenery is given by Dr. Livingstone. “Our path lay partly along a ridge, with a deep valley on each side. On the left the valley was filled with primeval forests, into which elephants, when wounded, escape completely. The bottom of this great valley was two thousand feet below us. Then ranges of mountains, with villages on their bases, rose as far as they could reach. On our right there was another deep but narrow gorge, and mountains much higher than on the ridge close adjacent. Our ridge wound from side to side, and took us to the edge of deep precipices,—first on the right, then on the left, till down we came to the villages of chief Monandenda. The houses were all filled with fire-wood, and each had a bed on a raised platform in an inner room.
“The paths are very skilfully placed on the tops of ridges of hills, and all gulleys are avoided; otherwise the distance would be doubled and the fatigue greatly increased. The paths seem to have been used for ages; they are worn deep on the heights, and in the hollows a little mound rises on each side, formed by the feet tossing a little soil on one side. Many villages teeming with a prodigious population were passed on the route.”
Approaching a village they were met by a company of natives beating a drum. This is a signal of peace: if war be meant the attack is stealthy. The people are friendly if they have not been assailed and plundered by the Arabs. The arrows used are small, made of strong grass-stalks, and poisoned; those for elephants and buffaloes are large and poisoned also. The two sons of Moenékuss, who had lately died, had taken his place. As there were signs of suspicion on their part, the ceremony of mixing blood was performed. This consists in making a small incision on the forearm of each person and then mixing the bloods and making declarations and vows of friendship. Moenembagg, the elder of the two sons, and the spokesman on all important occasions said, “Your people must not steal: we never do,”—which was no unwarrantable claim in behalf of his tribe. Blood in a small quantity was then conveyed from one to the other by a fig-leaf. “No stealing of fowls or of men,” said this chief. “Catch the thief and bring him to me. One who steals a person is a pig,” said Mohamad. Stealing, however, began on our side, a slave purloining a fowl. “They had good reason,” says Livingstone, “to enjoin honesty upon us. They think that we have come to kill them; we light on them as if from another world; no letters come to tell who we are or what we want. We cannot conceive their state of isolation and helplessness, with nothing to trust but their charms and idols, both being bits of wood.”
The village huts are very inconvenient, with low roofs and low door-ways. The men build them, but the women have to keep them well supplied with fire-wood and water. They carry their burdens in large baskets hung to the shoulders, like some of the fish-women in European cities.