A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries

The Shiré marshes support prodigious numbers of many kinds of water-fowl.  An hour at the mast-head unfolds novel views of life in an African marsh.  Near the edge, and on the branches of some favourite tree, rest scores of plotuses and cormorants, which stretch their snake-like necks, and in mute amazement turn one eye and then another towards the approaching monster.  By and-by the timid ones begin to fly off, or take “headers” into the stream; but a few of the bolder, or more composed, remain, only taking the precaution to spread their wings ready for instant flight.  The pretty ardetta (Herodias bubulcus), of a light yellow colour when at rest, but seemingly of a pure white when flying, takes wing, and sweeps across the green grass in large numbers, often showing us where buffaloes and elephants are, by perching on their backs.  Flocks of ducks, of which the kind called “Soriri” (Dendrocygna personata) is most abundant, being night feeders, meditate quietly by the small lagoons, until startled by the noise of the steam machinery.  Pelicans glide over the water, catching fish, while the Scopus (Scopus umbretta) and large herons peer intently into pools.  The large black and white spur-winged goose (a constant marauder of native gardens) springs up, and circles round to find out what the disturbance can be, and then settles down again with a splash.  Hundreds of Linongolos (Anastomus lamelligerus) rise on the wing from the clumps of reeds, or low trees (the Eschinomena, from which pith hats are made), on which they build in colonies, and are speedily high in mid-air.  Charming little red and yellow weavers (Ploceidæ) remind one of butterflies, as they fly in and out of the tall grass, or hang to the mouths of their pendent nests, chattering briskly to their mates within.  These weavers seem to have “cock nests,” built with only a roof, and a perch beneath, with a doorway on each side.  The natives say they are made to protect the bird from the rain.  Though her husband is very attentive, we have seen the hen bird tearing her mate’s nest to pieces, but why we cannot tell.  Kites and vultures are busy overhead, beating the ground for their repast of carrion; and the solemn-looking, stately-stepping Marabout, with a taste for dead fish, or men, stalks slowly along the almost stagnant channels.  Groups of men and boys are searching diligently in various places for lotus and other roots.  Some are standing in canoes, on the weed-covered ponds, spearing fish, while others are punting over the small intersecting streams, to examine their sunken fish-baskets.

Towards evening, hundreds of pretty little hawks (Erythropus vespertinus) are seen flying in a southerly direction, and feeding on dragon-flies and locusts.  They come, apparently, from resting on the palm-trees during the heat of the day.  Flocks of scissor-bills (Rhyncops) are then also on the wing, and in search of food, ploughing the water with their lower mandibles, which are nearly half an inch longer than the upper ones.

At the north-eastern end of the marsh, and about three miles from the river, commences a great forest of palm-trees (Borassus Æthiopium).  It extends many miles, and at one point comes close to the river.  The grey trunks and green tops of this immense mass of trees give a pleasing tone of colour to the view.  The mountain-range, which rises close behind the palms, is generally of a cheerful green, and has many trees, with patches of a lighter tint among them, as if spots of land had once been cultivated.  The sharp angular rocks and dells on its sides have the appearance of a huge crystal broken; and this is so often the case in Africa, that one can guess pretty nearly at sight whether a range is of the old crystalline rocks or not.  The Borassus, though not an oil-bearing palm, is a useful tree.  The fibrous pulp round the large nuts is of a sweet fruity taste, and is eaten by men and elephants.  The natives bury the nuts until the kernels begin to sprout; when dug up and broken, the inside resembles coarse potatoes, and is prized in times of scarcity as nutritious food.  During several months of the year, palm-wine, or sura, is obtained in large quantities; when fresh, it is a pleasant drink, somewhat like champagne, and not at all intoxicating; though, after standing a few hours, it becomes highly so.  Sticks, a foot long, are driven into notches in the hard outside of the tree—the inside being soft or hollow—to serve as a ladder; the top of the fruit-shoot is cut off, and the sap, pouring out at the fresh wound, is caught in an earthen pot, which is hung at the point.  A thin slice is taken off the end, to open the pores, and make the juice flow every time the owner ascends to empty the pot.  Temporary huts are erected in the forest, and men and boys remain by their respective trees day and night; the nuts, fish, and wine, being their sole food.  The Portuguese use the palm-wine as yeast, and it makes bread so light, that it melts in the mouth like froth.

Beyond the marsh the country is higher, and has a much larger population.  We passed a long line of temporary huts, on a plain on the right bank, with crowds of men and women hard at work making salt.  They obtain it by mixing the earth, which is here highly saline, with water, in a pot with a small hole in it, and then evaporating the liquid, which runs through, in the sun.  From the number of women we saw carrying it off in bags, we concluded that vast quantities must be made at these works.  It is worth observing that on soils like this, containing salt, the cotton is of larger and finer staple than elsewhere.  We saw large tracts of this rich brackish soil both in the Shiré and Zambesi valleys, and hence, probably, sea-island cotton would do well; a single plant of it, reared by Major Sicard, flourished and produced the long staple and peculiar tinge of this celebrated variety, though planted only in the street at Tette; and there also a salt efflorescence appears, probably from decomposition of the rock, off which the people scrape it for use.

The large village of the chief, Mankokwé, occupies a site on the right bank; he owns a number of fertile islands, and is said to be the Rundo, or paramount chief, of a large district.  Being of an unhappy suspicious disposition, he would not see us; so we thought it best to move on, rather than spend time in seeking his favour.

On the 25th August we reached Dakanamoio island, opposite the perpendicular bluff on which Chibisa’s village stands; he had gone, with most of his people, to live near the Zambesi, but his headman was civil, and promised us guides and whatever else we needed.  A few of the men were busy cleaning, sorting, spinning, and weaving cotton.  This is a common sight in nearly every village, and each family appears to have its patch of cotton, as our own ancestors in Scotland had each his patch of flax.  Near sunset an immense flock of the large species of horn-bill (Buceros cristatus) came here to roost on the great trees which skirt the edge of the cliff.  They leave early in the morning, often before sunrise, for their feeding-places, coming and going in pairs.  They are evidently of a loving disposition, and strongly attached to each other, the male always nestling close beside his mate.  A fine male fell to the ground, from fear, at the report of Dr. Kirk’s gun; it was caught and kept on board; the female did not go off in the mornings to feed with the others, but flew round the ship, anxiously trying, by her plaintive calls, to induce her beloved one to follow her: she came again in the evenings to repeat the invitations.  The poor disconsolate captive soon refused to eat, and in five days died of grief, because he could not have her company.  No internal injury could be detected after death.

Chibisa and his wife, with a natural show of parental feeling, had told the Doctor, on his previous visit, that a few years before some of Chisaka’s men had kidnapped and sold their little daughter, and that she was now a slave to the padrè at Tette.  On his return to Tette, the Doctor tried hard to ransom and restore the girl to her parents, and offered twice the value of a slave; the padrè seemed willing, but she could not be found.  This padrè was better than the average men of the country; and, being always civil and obliging, would probably have restored her gratuitously, but she had been sold, it might be to the distant tribe Bazizulu, or he could not tell where.  Custom had rendered his feelings callous, and Chibisa had to be told that his child would never return.  It is this callous state of mind which leads some of our own blood to quote Scripture in support of slavery.  If we could afford to take a backward step in civilization, we might find men among ourselves who would in like manner prove Mormonism or any other enormity to be divine.

We left the ship on the 28th of August, 1859, for the discovery of Lake Nyassa.  Our party numbered forty-two in all—four whites, thirty-six Makololo, and two guides.  We did not actually need so many, either for carriage or defence; but took them because we believed that, human nature being everywhere the same, blacks are as ready as whites to take advantage of the weak, and are as civil and respectful to the powerful.  We armed our men with muskets, which gave us influence, although it did not add much to our strength, as most of the men had never drawn a trigger, and in any conflict would in all probability have been more dangerous to us than the enemy.

Our path crossed the valley, in a north-easterly direction, up the course of a beautiful flowing stream.  Many of the gardens had excellent cotton growing in them.  An hour’s march brought us to the foot of the Manganja hills, up which lay the toilsome road.  The vegetation soon changed; as we rose bamboos appeared, and new trees and plants were met with, which gave such incessant employment to Dr. Kirk, that he travelled the distance three times over.  Remarkably fine trees, one of which has oil-yielding seeds, and belongs to the mahogany family, grow well in the hollows along the rivulet courses.  The ascent became very fatiguing, and we were glad of a rest.  Looking back from an elevation of a thousand feet, we beheld a lovely prospect.  The eye takes in at a glance the valley beneath, and the many windings of its silver stream Makubula, or Kubvula, from the shady hill-side, where it emerges in foaming haste, to where it slowly glides into the tranquil Shiré; then the Shiré itself is seen for many a mile above and below Chibisa’s, and the great level country beyond, with its numerous green woods; until the prospect, west and north-west, is bounded far away by masses of peaked and dome-shaped blue mountains, that fringe the highlands of the Maravi country.

After a weary march we halted at Makolongwi, the village of Chitimba.  It stands in a woody hollow on the first of the three terraces of the Manganja hills, and, like all other Manganja villages, is surrounded by an impenetrable hedge of poisonous euphorbia.  This tree casts a deep shade, which would render it difficult for bowmen to take aim at the villagers inside.  The grass does not grow beneath it, and this may be the reason why it is so universally used, for when dry the grass would readily convey fire to the huts inside; moreover, the hedge acts as a fender to all flying sparks.  As strangers are wont to do, we sat down under some fine trees near the entrance of the village.  A couple of mats, made of split reeds, were spread for the white men to sit on; and the headman brought a seguati, or present, of a small goat and a basket of meal.  The full value in beads and cotton cloth was handed to him in return.  He measured the cloth, doubled it, and then measured that again.  The beads were scrutinized; he had never seen beads of that colour before, and should like to consult with his comrades before accepting them, and this, after repeated examinations and much anxious talk, he concluded to do.  Meal and peas were then brought for sale.  A fathom of blue cotton cloth, a full dress for man or woman, was produced.  Our Makololo headman, Sininyané, thinking a part of it was enough for the meal, was proceeding to tear it, when Chitimba remarked that it was a pity to cut such a nice dress for his wife, he would rather bring more meal.  “All right,” said Sininyané; “but look, the cloth is very wide, so see that the basket which carries the meal be wide too, and add a cock to make the meal taste nicely.”  A brisk trade sprang up at once, each being eager to obtain as fine things as his neighbour,—and all were in good humour.  Women and girls began to pound and grind meal, and men and boys chased the screaming fowls over the village, until they ran them down.  In a few hours the market was completely glutted with every sort of native food; the prices, however, rarely fell, as they could easily eat what was not sold.

We slept under the trees, the air being pheasant, and no mosquitoes on the hills.  According to our usual plan of marching, by early dawn our camp was in motion.  After a cup of coffee and a bit of biscuit we were on the way.  The air was deliciously cool, and the path a little easier than that of yesterday.  We passed a number of villages, occupying very picturesque spots among the hills, and in a few hours gained the upper terrace, 3000 feet above the level of the sea.  The plateau lies west of the Milanjé mountains, and its north-eastern border slopes down to Lake Shirwa.  We were all charmed with the splendid country, and looked with never-failing delight on its fertile plains, its numerous hills, and majestic mountains.  In some of the passes we saw bramble-berries growing; and the many other flowers, though of great beauty, did not remind us of youth and of home like the ungainly thorny bramble-bushes.  We were a week in crossing the highlands in a northerly direction; then we descended into the Upper Shiré Valley, which is nearly 1200 feet above the level of the sea.  This valley is wonderfully fertile, and supports a large population.  After leaving the somewhat flat-topped southern portion, the most prominent mountain of the Zomba range is Njongoné, which has a fine stream running past its northern base.  We were detained at the end of the chain some days by one of our companions being laid up with fever.  One night we were suddenly aroused by buffaloes rushing close by the sick-bed.  We were encamped by a wood on the border of a marsh, but our patient soon recovered, notwithstanding the unfavourable situation, and the poor accommodation.

The Manganja country is delightfully well watered.  The clear, cool, gushing streams are very numerous.  Once we passed seven fine brooks and a spring in a single hour, and this, too, near the close of the dry season.  Mount Zomba, which is twenty miles long, and from 7000 to 8000 feet high, has a beautiful stream flowing through a verdant valley on its summit, and running away down into Lake Shirwa.  The highlands are well wooded, and many trees, admirable for their height and timber, grow on the various watercourses.  “Is this country good for cattle?” we inquired of a Makololo herdsman, whose occupation had given him skill in pasturage.  “Truly,” he replied, “do you not see abundance of those grasses which the cattle love, and get fat upon?”  Yet the people have but few goats, and fewer sheep.  With the exception of an occasional leopard, there are no beasts of prey to disturb domestic animals.  Wool-sheep would, without doubt, thrive on these highlands.  Part of the Upper Shiré valley has a lady paramount, named Nyango; and in her dominions women rank higher and receive more respectful treatment than their sisters on the hills.

The hill chief, Mongazi, called his wife to take charge of a present we had given him.  She dropped down on her knees, clapping her hands in reverence, before and after receiving our presents from his lordly hands.  It was painful to see the abject manner in which the women of the hill tribes knelt beside the path as we passed; but a great difference took place when we got into Nyango’s country.

On entering a village, we proceeded, as all strangers do, at once to the Boalo: mats of split reeds or bamboo were usually spread for us to sit on.  Our guides then told the men who might be there, who we were, whence we had come, whither we wanted to go, and what were our objects.  This information was duly carried to the chief, who, if a sensible man, came at once; but, if he happened to be timid and suspicious, waited until he had used divination, and his warriors had time to come in from outlying hamlets.  When he makes his appearance, all the people begin to clap their hands in unison, and continue doing so till he sits down opposite to us.  His counsellors take their places beside him.  He makes a remark or two, and is then silent for a few seconds.  Our guides then sit down in front of the chief and his counsellors, and both parties lean forward, looking earnestly at each other; the chief repeats a word, such as “Ambuiatu” (our Father, or master)—or “moio” (life), and all clap their hands.  Another word is followed by two claps, a third by still more clapping, when each touches the ground with both hands placed together.  Then all rise and lean forward with measured clap, and sit down again with clap, clap, clap, fainter, and still fainter, till the last dies away, or is brought to an end by a smart loud clap from the chief.  They keep perfect time in this species of court etiquette.  Our guides now tell the chief, often in blank verse, all they have already told his people, with the addition perhaps of their own suspicions of the visitors.  He asks some questions, and then converses with us through the guides.  Direct communication between the chief and the head of the stranger party is not customary.  In approaching they often ask who is the spokesman, and the spokesman of the chief addresses the person indicated exclusively.  There is no lack of punctilious good manners.  The accustomed presents are exchanged with civil ceremoniousness; until our men, wearied and hungry, call out, “English do not buy slaves, they buy food,” and then the people bring meal, maize, fowls, batatas, yams, beans, beer, for sale.

The Manganja are an industrious race; and in addition to working in iron, cotton, and basket-making, they cultivate the soil extensively.  All the people of a village turn out to labour in the fields.  It is no uncommon thing to see men, women, and children hard at work, with the baby lying close by beneath a shady bush.  When a new piece of woodland is to be cleared, they proceed exactly as farmers do in America.  The trees are cut down with their little axes of soft native iron; trunks and branches are piled up and burnt, and the ashes spread on the soil.  The corn is planted among the standing stumps which are left to rot.  If grass land is to be brought under cultivation, as much tall grass as the labourer can conveniently lay hold of is collected together and tied into a knot.  He then strikes his hoe round the tufts to sever the roots, and leaving all standing, proceeds until the whole ground assumes the appearance of a field covered with little shocks of corn in harvest.  A short time before the rains begin, these grass shocks are collected in small heaps, covered with earth, and burnt, the ashes and burnt soil being used to fertilize the ground.  Large crops of the mapira, or Egyptian dura (Holcus sorghum), are raised, with millet, beans, and ground-nuts; also patches of yams, rice, pumpkins, cucumbers, cassava, sweet potatoes, tobacco, and hemp, or bang (Cannabis setiva).  Maize is grown all the year round.  Cotton is cultivated at almost every village.  Three varieties of cotton have been found in the country, namely, two foreign and one native.  The “tonjé manga,” or foreign cotton, the name showing that it has been introduced, is of excellent quality, and considered at Manchester to be nearly equal to the best New Orleans.  It is perennial, but requires replanting once in three years.  A considerable amount of this variety is grown in the Upper and Lower Shiré valleys.  Every family of any importance owns a cotton patch which, from the entire absence of weeds, seemed to be carefully cultivated.  Most were small, none seen on this journey exceeding half an acre; but on the former trip some were observed of more than twice that size.

The “tonjé cadja,” or indigenous cotton, is of shorter staple, and feels in the hand like wool.  This kind has to be planted every season in the highlands; yet, because it makes stronger cloth, many of the people prefer it to the foreign cotton; the third variety is not found here.  It was remarked to a number of men near the Shiré Lakelet, a little further on towards Nyassa, “You should plant plenty of cotton, and probably the English will come and buy it.”  “Truly,” replied a far-travelled Babisa trader to his fellows, “the country is full of cotton, and if these people come to buy they will enrich us.”  Our own observation on the cotton cultivated convinced us that this was no empty flourish, but a fact.  Everywhere we met with it, and scarcely ever entered a village without finding a number of men cleaning, spinning, and weaving.  It is first carefully separated from the seed by the fingers, or by an iron roller, on a little block of wood, and rove out into long soft bands without twist.  Then it receives its first twist on the spindle, and becomes about the thickness of coarse candlewick; after being taken off and wound into a large ball, it is given the final hard twist, and spun into a firm cop on the spindle again: all the processes being painfully slow.

Iron ore is dug out of the hills, and its manufacture is the staple trade of the southern highlands.  Each village has its smelting-house, its charcoal-burners, and blacksmiths.  They make good axes, spears, needles, arrowheads, bracelets and anklets, which, considering the entire absence of machinery, are sold at surprisingly low rates; a hoe over two pounds in weight is exchanged for calico of about the value of fourpence.  In villages near Lake Shirwa and elsewhere, the inhabitants enter pretty largely into the manufacture of crockery, or pottery, making by hand all sorts of cooking, water, and grain pots, which they ornament with plumbago found in the hills.  Some find employment in weaving neat baskets from split bamboos, and others collect the fibre of the buazé, which grows abundantly on the hills, and make it into fish-nets.  These they either use themselves, or exchange with the fishermen on the river or lakes for dried fish and salt.  A great deal of native trade is carried on between the villages, by means of barter in tobacco, salt, dried fish, skins, and iron.  Many of the men are intelligent-looking, with well-shaped heads, agreeable faces, and high foreheads.  We soon learned to forget colour, and we frequently saw countenances resembling those of white people we had known in England, which brought back the looks of forgotten ones vividly before the mind.  The men take a good deal of pride in the arrangement of their hair; the varieties of style are endless.  One trains his long locks till they take the admired form of the buffalo’s horns; others prefer to let their hair hang in a thick coil down their backs, like that animal’s tail; while another wears it in twisted cords, which, stiffened by fillets of the inner bark of a tree wound spirally round each curl, radiate from the head in all directions.  Some have it hanging all round the shoulders in large masses; others shave it off altogether.  Many shave part of it into ornamental figures, in which the fancy of the barber crops out conspicuously.  About as many dandies run to seed among the blacks as among the whites.  The Man ganja adorn their bodies extravagantly, wearing rings on their fingers and thumbs, besides throatlets, bracelets, and anklets of brass, copper, or iron.  But the most wonderful of ornaments, if such it may be called, is the pelélé, or upper-lip ring of the women.  The middle of the upper lip of the girls is pierced close to the septum of the nose, and a small pin inserted to prevent the puncture closing up.  After it has healed, the pin is taken out and a larger one is pressed into its place, and so on successively for weeks, and months, and years.  The process of increasing the size of the lip goes on till its capacity becomes so great that a ring of two inches diameter can be introduced with ease.  All the highland women wear the pelélé, and it is common on the Upper and Lower Shiré.  The poorer classes make them of hollow or of solid bamboo, but the wealthier of ivory or tin.  The tin pelélé is often made in the form of a small dish.  The ivory one is not unlike a napkin-ring.  No woman ever appears in public without the pelélé, except in times of mourning for the dead.  It is frightfully ugly to see the upper lip projecting two inches beyond the tip of the nose.  When an old wearer of a hollow bamboo ring smiles, by the action of the muscles of the cheeks, the ring and lip outside it are dragged back and thrown above the eyebrows.  The nose is seen through the middle of the ring, amid the exposed teeth show how carefully they have been chipped to look like those of a cat or crocodile.  The pelélé of an old lady, Chikanda Kadzé, a chieftainess, about twenty miles north of Morambala, hung down below her chin, with, of course, a piece of the upper lip around its border.  The labial letters cannot be properly pronounced, but the under lip has to do its best for them, against the upper teeth and gum.  Tell them it makes them ugly; they had better throw it away; they reply, “Kodi!  Really! it is the fashion.”  How this hideous fashion originated is an enigma.  Can thick lips ever have been thought beautiful, and this mode of artificial enlargement resorted to in consequence?  The constant twiddling of the pelélé with the tongue by the younger women suggested the irreverent idea that it might have been invented to give safe employment to that little member.  “Why do the women wear these things?” we inquired of the old chief, Chinsunsé.  Evidently surprised at such a stupid question, he replied, “For beauty, to be sure!  Men have beards and whiskers; women have none; and what kind of creature would a woman be without whiskers, and without the pelélé?  She would have a mouth like a man, and no beard; ha! ha! ha!”  Afterwards on the Rovuma, we found men wearing the pelélé, as well as women.  An idea suggested itself on seeing the effects of the slight but constant pressure exerted on the upper gum and front teeth, of which our medical brethren will judge the value.  In many cases the upper front teeth, instead of the natural curve outwards, which the row presents, had been pressed so as to appear as if the line of alveoli in which they were planted had an inward curve.  As this was produced by the slight pressure of the pelélé backwards, persons with too prominent teeth might by slight, but long-continued pressure, by some appliance only as elastic as the lip, have the upper gum and teeth depressed, especially in youth, more easily than is usually imagined.  The pressure should be applied to the upper gum more than to the teeth.