466 GEOLOGICAL STRUCTURE. 



west of Braganza is reported to be mountainous, well wooded and 

 watered ; wild coffee is abundant, and the people even make their 

 huts of coffee-trees. The rivers Dande, Senza, and Lucalla are 

 said to rise in one mountain range. Numerous tribes inhabit the 

 country to the north, who are all independent. The Portuguese 

 power extends chiefly over the tribes through whose lands we 

 have passed. It may be said to be firmly seated only between 

 the rivers Dande and Coanza. It extends inland about three 

 hundred miles to the River Quango ; and the population, accord- 

 ing to the imperfect data afforded by the census, given annually 

 by the commandants of the fifteen or sixteen districts into which 

 it is divided, can not be under 600,000 souls. 



Leaving Malange, we passed quickly, without deviation, along 

 the path by which we had come. At Sanza (lat. 9° 37' 46" S., 

 long. 16° 59 / E.) we expected to get a little seed-wheat, but this 

 was not now to be found in Angola. The underlying rock of the 

 whole of this section is that same sandstone which we have before 

 noticed, but it gradually becomes finer in the grain, with the ad- 

 dition of a little mica, the farther we go eastward ; we enter upon 

 clay shale at Tala Mungongo (lat. 9° 42 / 37" S., long. 17° 27' 

 E.), and find it dipping a little to the west. The general geolog- 

 ical structure is a broad fringe of mica and sandstone schist (about 

 15° E.), dipping in toward the centre of the country, beneath these 

 horizontal and sedimentary rocks of more recent date, which form 

 an inland basin. The fringe is not, however, the highest in alti- 

 tude, though the oldest in age. 



While at this latter place we met a native of Bihe who has vis- 

 ited the country of Shinte three times for the purposes of trade. 

 He gave us some of the news of that distant part, but not a word 

 of the Makololo, who have always been represented in the coun- 

 tries to the north as a desperately savage race, whom no trader 

 could visit with safety. The half-caste traders whom we met at 

 Shinte's had returned to Angola with sixty-six slaves and upward 

 of fifty tusks of ivory. As we came along the path, we daily met 

 long lines of carriers bearing large square masses of beeswax, each 

 about a hundred pounds weight, and numbers of elephants' tusks, 

 the property of Angolese merchants. Many natives were proceed- 

 ing to the coast also on their own account, carrying beeswax, ivo- 

 ry, and sweet oil. They appeared to travel in perfect security ; 



