The same diseases to which civilized peoples are subject prevail in Central and East Africa. The most terrible scourge of all is the small-pox; its ravages are seen everywhere on the line of caravans and in the depopulation of villages. A rigorous quarantine is attempted, yet multitudes die by this foul and fearful disease. If any of a caravan become sick with it, they are left in the wilderness, as the caravan can not stop. The poor sufferers will not be received into any village. They therefore betake themselves to the jungle, with store of food and water, and there await the issue of recovery or death,—most frequently the latter. The skulls bleaching in the air on the line of every caravan indicate the ravages made by this loathsome disease.
Mr. Stanley thinks the Wanyamwezi are the most remarkable tribe in Central Africa. His fine characterization of them, given below, is taken from his interesting book, “How I found Livingstone.”
“A beau ideal of a Mnyamwezi to me will be a tall, long-limbed black man, with a good-natured face, always with a broad smile upon it; displaying in the upper row of teeth a small hole, which was cut out when he was a boy to denote his tribe; with hundreds of long, wiry ringlets hanging down his neck; almost naked, giving me a full view of a form which would make an excellent model for a black Apollo. I have seen many of this tribe in the garb of the freedmen of Zanzibar, sporting a turban of new American sheeting, or wearing the long diskdasheh (shirt) of the Arab, presenting as fine and intelligent an appearance as any Msawahili from the Zanzibar coast,—but I cannot rid myself of my ideal.
“A Mnyamwezi is the Yankee of Africa; he is a born trader and traveller. From days immemorial his tribe has monopolized the carrying of goods from one country to another. The Mnyamwezi is the camel, the horse, the mule, the ass, the beast of burden to which all travellers anxiously look to convey their luggage from the coast to the far African interior. The Arab can go nowhere without his help; the white traveller, bound on an exploring trip, cannot travel without him.... He is like the sailor, having his habitat in certain sailors’ boarding houses in great seaport towns, and, like the sailor, is a restless rover. The sea-coast to a Mnyamwezi is like New York to an English sailor. At New York the English sailor can re-ship with higher pay; so can the Mnyamwezi re-hire himself on the coast, for a return trip, at a higher rate than from Unyamwezi to the sea. He is in such demand, and during war time so scarce, that his pay is great, ranging from thirty-six to one hundred yards of cloth. A hundred of these bites de somme will readily cost the traveller 10,000 yards of cloth even as far as Unyanyembe, a three months’ journey, and 10,000 yards of cloth represent $5,000 in gold.
“The Wanyamwezi, weighted with the bales of Zanzibar, containing cottons and domestics from Massachusetts, calicoes from England, prints from Muscat, cloths from Cutch, beads from Germany, brass wire from Great Britain, may be found on the Lualaba, in the forests of Ukawendi, on the hills of Uganda, the mountains of Karagwah, on the plains of Urori, on the plateau of Ugogo, in the park lands of Ukonongo, in the swamps of Useguhha, in the defiles of Usagara, in the wilderness of Ubena, among the pastoral tribes of the Watuta, trudging along the banks of the Rufigi, in slave-trading Kilwa,—everywhere throughout Central Africa.
“While journeying with caravans they are docile and tractable; in their villages they are a merry-making set; on trading expeditions of their own they are keen and clever; as Ruga-Ruga they are unscrupulous and bold; in Ukonongo they are hunters; in Usukuma they are drovers and iron smelters; in Lunda they are energetic searchers for ivory; on the coast they are a wondering and awe-struck people.”
The Wanyamwezi are very industrious and quite ingenious. They smelt their iron, and make their weapons of war and implements of agriculture. They are ready to exchange their hatchets, bill-hooks, spears, bows, etc., for cloth. It is a common sight,—the peddler endeavoring to make a barter trade with his various wares. He will sell a first-class bow for four yards of sheeting, and two yards will buy a dozen arrows.
They are quite clever smiths and manufacture iron and copper wire. The process is as follows: a heavy piece of iron with a funnel-shaped hole is firmly fixed in the fork of a tree. A fine rod is then thrust into it and a line attached to the first few inches which can be coaxed through. A number of men haul on this line singing and dancing in tune and thus it is drawn through the first drill; it is subsequently passed through others to render it finer. Excellent wire is the result.
Love of music is one of the characteristics of this tribe, as of almost all Africans. Though the music is rude, yet those who hear it are not usually the most accomplished and fastidious critics. It therefore has its uses and merits. Sometimes it is made the vehicle of satire or humor. The latest scandal or sensation is incorporated into the song, for many of the people have the faculty of the improvisatore, and so contribute to the amusement or interest of their villages by these allusions to or criticisms of matters of public concern or personal gossip.
The women are generally very homely and coarse, unlike those of the Batusi who are very often beautiful. Their chief ornament is of the half-moon shape. They are not generous having learned the Arab adage “nothing for nothing” yet they are respectful in deportment.