MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS. 173 



to make it contract : the instruments are beaten with tho 

 hands. 



The piano, named " marimba," consists of two bars of 

 wood placed side by side, here quite straight, but, farther 

 north, bent round so as to resemble half the tire of a car- 

 riage-wheel; across these are placed about fifteen wooden 

 keys, each of which is two or three inches broad and 

 fifteen or eighteen inches long; their thickness is regu- 

 lated according to the deepness of the note required : each 

 of the keys has a calabash beneath it; from the upper part 

 of each a portion is cut off to enable them to embrace the 

 bars, and form hollow sounding-boards to the keys, which 

 also are of different sizes, according to the note required; 

 and little drumsticks elicit the music. Eapidity of execu- 

 tion seems much admired among them, and the music is 

 pleasant to the ear. In Angola the Portuguese use tho 

 marimba in their dances. 



When nine speakers had concluded their orations, Shinto 

 stood up, and so did all the people. He had maintained 

 true African dignity of manner all the while, but my 

 people remarked that he scarcely ever took his eyes off me 

 for a moment. About a thousand people were present, 

 according to my calculation, and three hundred soldiers. 

 The sun had now become hot; and the scene ended by the 

 Mambari discharging their guns. 



l&th. — We were awakened during the night by a message 

 from Shinte, requesting a visit at a very unseasonable hour. 

 As I was just in the sweating-stage of an intermittent, and 

 the path to the town lay through a wet valley, I declined 

 going. Kolimbota, who knows their customs best, urged 

 me to go ; but, independent of sickness, I hated words of 

 the night and deeds of darkness. "I was neither a hyena 

 nor a witch." Kolimbota thought that we ought to con- 

 form to their wishes in every thing: I thought we ought 

 to have some choice in the matter as well, which put him 

 into high dudgeon. However, at ten next morning we 

 went, and were led into the courts of Shinte, the walls of 



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