There was great talk at Loanda about sending an expedition to punish these natives, but, as usual, it ended in smoke, and no white man has since been allowed to pass through the Mossulo country.
Several years after, the King of Mossulo sent an embassy to me at Ambriz, begging me to open a factory at Mossulo. On condition that I, or any white man in my employ, should be free to pass backwards and forwards from Loanda to Ambriz, I promised to do so, and was taken to the king’s town at Mossulo, where it was all arranged. I did not believe them, of course, but I gave a few fathoms of cloth and other goods that they might build me a hut on the cliff at Mossulo Bay, which they did, and I then declared myself ready to send a clerk with goods to commence trading, as soon as they should send me hammock-boys to carry me to Loanda. As I expected, they never sent them, and for several years, whilst the hut on the cliff lasted, it served as a capital landmark to the steamers and ships on the coast. The Governor-General at Loanda, to prevent traders from establishing factories at Mossulo Grande, warned us at Ambriz that if we did so we must take all risks, that he would not only not protect us, but that all goods for trading at Mossulo would have to be entered and cleared at the Loanda custom-house. Far from such disgraceful pusillanimity being censured at Loanda, it was, with few exceptions, considered by the Portuguese there as a very praiseworthy measure.
The rock of the country at Libongo is a black shale; also strongly impregnated with bitumen. A Portuguese at Loanda, believing that this circumstance indicated coal in depth, sunk a shaft some few fathoms in this shale, and I visited the spot to see if any organic remains were to be found in the rock extracted, but could not discover any. About half way from Libongo to the place where I saw the bituminous sandstone formation, I observed a well-defined rocky ridge of quartz running about east and west, which appeared to have been irrupted through the shale.
The ground about Libongo is evidently very fertile, the mandioca and other plantations being most luxuriant, and I particularly noticed some very fine sugar-cane. Some of the tamarind-trees were extremely fine, and on the stem of a very large one a couple of the “engonguis,” or double bells, were nailed, which had belonged to the former native town there, and as they are considered “fetish,” no black would steal or touch them.
A few hours’ journey (or about fifteen miles) to the south of Libongo is the River Dande, navigable only by large barges, and draining a fertile country.
It is only within the last two years that the value of this river, for trading or produce, has attracted attention at Loanda, and I am glad to say that it was owing to two foreign houses that trading was commenced there on anything like a respectable scale. The interior is rich in coffee, gum-copal, ground-nuts, and india-rubber, and this country promises an important future; cattle thrive here, and Loanda is now supplied with a small quantity of excellent butter and cream cheese from some herds in the vicinity of this river near the bar.
Limestone is also burnt into lime, which is sold at a good price at Loanda; and were the Portuguese and natives more enterprising and industrious, the banks of the river would be covered with valuable gardens and plantations; but apathy reigns supreme, and the authorities at Loanda prevent any attempt to get out of this state by the obstructions of all kinds of petty and harassing imposts, rules, and regulations, having no possible aim but the collection of a despicable amount of fees to keep alive and in idleness a few miserable officials.
The country is comparatively level, and calls for no particular description, till about eighteen miles southward the high and bold cliff of Point Lagostas (Point Lobsters) marks the bay into which runs the beautiful little river Bengo, or Zenza, as it is called farther inland.
This is even a smaller river than the Dande, though more important from its near proximity to Loanda, and the remarks as to the wonderful indifference and hindrance to the development of the River Dande, apply with still greater force to the Bengo, a very mine of wealth at the doors of Loanda! It is hardly possible to restrain within reasonable limits the expression of surprise at the fact that Loanda, with its thousands of inhabitants, should be still destitute of a good supply of drinking water, when there is a river of splendid water only nine miles off, whence it receives an insignificant and totally inadequate supply brought in casks only, carried by a few rotten barges and canoes that are often prevented from leaving or entering the river for days together, on account of the surf at the bar. A small cask of Bengo water, holding about six gallons, costs from twopence to fourpence! All kinds of fruit and vegetables grow luxuriantly on the banks of the Bengo, and yet Loanda, where nothing can grow from its sandy and arid soil, is almost unprovided with either—a few heads of salad or cabbage, or a few turnips and carrots being there considered a fine present.
At Point Lagostas a good deal of gypsum is found, and also specimens of native sulphur.