384 THE WORLD'S WONDERS. 



ON THE BANKS OF THE LUALABA. 



ON the 30th of March, after a pleasant journey of about fifty 

 miles, Livingstone reached the Lualaba river at a village called 

 Nyangwe. He found the stream to be much larger than he 

 expected, at its narrowest parts being at least half-a-mile broad 

 and so deep that at no season of the year is it fordable ; the banks 

 are steep and deep, though the current is hardly more than two 

 miles an hour, running toward the north. Several soundings 

 showed a depth from nine feet near shore to twenty feet in the 

 center of the stream. Villages lined the river bank, and so 

 numerous are the people that one morning Livingstone counted 

 seven hundred market women file past him. Yet, notwithstand- 

 ing the great number of people, he was unable to get any canoes ; 

 to gain the confidence of the natives, he built a hut and concluded 

 to remain awhile among them, or until they concluded to assist 

 him. 



The market scenes in the villages along the river are interest- 

 ing and not altogether unlike those which may be witnessed in 

 Billingsgate fish-market, except in the articles offered for sale. 

 Here were queer vessels, snails, fruits, cowrie-shells, and name- 

 less things without number. One man had ten human under- 

 jaw-bones hung by a string over his shoulder ; on inquiry, he 

 professed to have killed and eaten the owners, and showed with 

 his knife how he cut up his victims. When Livingstone expressed 

 disgust he and others laughed. Two nice girls were trying 

 to sell their venture, which was roasted white ants, called 

 "gumbe." 



A DREADFUL MASSACRE. 



A VERT popular market had been established at the village of 

 Nyangwe, where Livingstone and a party of Arabs were stopping, 

 to which hundreds of people came daily with their simple wares, 

 from both sides of the river. No fear of the dreadful sequel 

 seemed to haunt the natives, but the Arabs had determined to 

 turn this little earthly paradise into a hell of murder. It was 

 almost an invariable custom with them to add murder to their 

 other horrid crimes, and as the traffic in slaves among the natives 



