Angola and the River Congo, vol. 2

by Joachim John Monteiro

About six or eight miles from Dondo up the river are the first cataracts of Cambambe. Immediately on leaving Dondo the river is enclosed by high hills or cliffs on both sides, and winds a good deal, so that a succession of fresh and seemingly more beautiful pictures is constantly presented to the traveller’s admiration as he ascends the river in a boat. The river is wide and deep, and the slopes and perpendicular sides of the hilly walls on either side are of endless variety of colour, both of rock, moss and lichen, plant and tree. Deep red iron-stained sandstone, conglomerate, blue clay slate, huge white-stemmed baobabs, dark masses of palm-trees, plots of large-leaved plantains, masses of trees overgrown with creepers, meet the eye in ever varying combination, and gradually the wide valley worn by the water becomes narrower and narrower, until at last it is a deep gorge with almost upright walls of clay slate, and the passage for the great body of water is barred right across by vast rocky ledges and peaks, over which, in the rainy season, it rushes and dashes with a deafening wild roar and mad flinging up into the air of showers of water and foam. The last time I saw these rapids I was accompanied by my wife, and we landed on a bank of gravel a little below the cataract and walked and scrambled on the rocks, till we were on a great ledge quite close to, and but little over the level of the waters; but, it being the end of the dry season, they were so far reduced as to run between the rocks in a swift dark oily-looking mass, and at such a considerable inclination and speed as to give the idea of vast and irresistible force. On the rocks covered over and splashed by the water, were growing masses of a curious semi-transparent plant with thick stems, and bearing minute white flowers.

The singular appearance of this plant, so exactly like a sea-weed, attracted our attention, and as I had never before observed it anywhere in my travels in Angola, we secured specimens, which we dried and preserved, and on forwarding them to Kew it was found to be a new genus of Podostemaceæ, and has been described by Dr. Weddell in the ‘Journal of the Linnean Society,’ xiv. 210, † 13, as the Angolæa fluitans.

It is said that coal has lately been discovered near the river on its southern bank, and not far from Dondo.

Of the old town of Cambambe, situated on the high ground over the cataract, but little else remains than the church and a few houses. The River Quanza is not navigable beyond the rapids, except perhaps for short distances and for small canoes. At Nhangui-a-pepi it is only a broad shallow stream, but with a very rocky bed; its source, however, is far beyond Pungo Andongo.

About the higher parts of the river a gigantic species of the “Bagre” (Bagrus) is found. This is a siluroid fish, and my attention was first called to its extraordinary dimensions by seeing a black using the flat top of the skull of one as a plate or dish. I was then in the province of Cambambe, and several times had an opportunity of asking natives from Pungo Andongo the size of these fish: one man told me that they were captured so large that two men were required to carry one fish slung on a pole on their shoulders by passing the pole through the gills, and that the tail then drags on the ground. Another black, who was a river fisherman, explained to me that the “bagres” were caught with an iron hook made on purpose by the native smiths and baited with a piece of meat; he gave me an idea of the thickness and size of the hook with a piece of twig, and it was as large as an ordinary shark-hook; he further drew on the ground the size of this large fish, and it was six feet long. Other natives who were with him joined in the description and corroborated him, and I am perfectly convinced that they spoke the truth, and were not exaggerating much. I wrote to some Portuguese traders at Pungo Andongo, asking them to send me the head of one in spirits, but of course I never got it.

Only the northern bank of the Quanza is subject to the Portuguese (with the exception of the town of Muxima), and the natives inhabiting it are greatly civilized and well behaved, and very civil. They are, of course, not industrious, the women cultivating the usual mandioca and other produce for food, and manufacturing palm-oil. A little tobacco is also cultivated by them, and the leaves when fully grown are gathered, and a string passed through the stem. This string of leaves is stretched round their huts to dry, and the large leaves thus hanging give them a curious appearance.

The first trips of the steamers caused the natives on either bank the most intense astonishment; they would race them along the banks, shouting and yelling; and when the steamers stopped at any place, crowds would flock round and come on board to stare at the machinery, which was universally pronounced to be a white man’s great “fetish.”

All natives are very fond of the “batuco” or dance, of which there are two kinds. The Ambriz blacks and those of the Congo country dance it in the following manner:—A ring is formed of the performers and spectators; “marimbas” are twanged and drums beaten vigorously, and all assembled clap their hands in time with the thumping of the drums, and shout a kind of chorus. The dancers, both men and women, jump with a yell into the ring, two or three at a time, and commence dancing. This consists almost exclusively of swaying the body about with only a slight movement of the feet, head, and arms, but at the same time the muscles of the shoulders, back, and hams, are violently twitched and convulsed. The greatest applause is given to those who can most strongly shake their flesh all over in this way. It is difficult to do, and appears to require considerable practice, and seems very fatiguing, for in a few minutes the dancers are streaming with perspiration and retire for others to take their places, and so they will often continue for a whole night long, or in dark nights, as long as the great heap of dry grass that they have provided lasts—the illumination being obtained by burning wisps of this grass, two or three blacks generally having the care of that part of the performance. The natives at these dances are dressed as usual in the ordinary waistcloth, the men arranging theirs so as to allow the ends to trail on the ground. There is nothing whatever indecent in them.

The “batuco” of the Bunda-speaking natives of Loanda and the interior is different. The ring of spectators and dancers, the illuminations, the “marimbas” and drums are the same, but only two performers jump into the ring at a time, a man and a girl or woman; they shuffle their feet with great rapidity, passing one another backwards and forwards, then retreat facing one another, and suddenly advancing, bring their stomachs together with a whack. They then retire, and another couple instantly take their places. This performance might be called somewhat indecent, but I do not believe that the natives attach the most remote idea of harm to the “batuco.”

The “marimba” is the musical instrument par excellence of the natives of Angola. In [Plate XI.] is represented the better made ones. It consists of a flat piece of wood, generally hollowed out, and with a number of thin iron tongues secured on it by cross bits, but so as to allow them to be pulled out more or less for the purpose of tuning. In front is affixed a wire, on which some glass beads are loosely strung that jangle when the instrument is played, which is done by holding it between both hands and twanging the tongues with the thumbs. The light wood of which the “marimbas” are made is that of the cotton-wood tree. They are also made with slips of the hard cuticle of the stem of the palm-leaf instead of the iron tongues, but these are the commoner instruments. Others are made smaller and with fewer tongues.