Chap. XXVII. FRIENDLY FEELINGS TOWARDS EUROPEANS. 555 



battle-axe in her hand, and helped her" husband to scream. She 

 was much excited, for she had never seen a white man before. 

 We rather liked Monze, for he soon felt at home amongst us, and 

 kept up conversation during much of the day. One head-man of 

 a village after another arrived, and each of them supplied us 

 liberally with maize, ground-nuts, and com. Monze gave us a goat 

 and a fowl, and appeared highly satisfied with a present of some 

 handkerchiefs I had got in my supplies left at the island. Being 

 of printed cotton, they excited great admiration ; and when I put 

 a gaudy-coloured one as a shawl about liis child, he said that he 

 would send for all Ins people to make a dance about it. In 

 telling them that my object was to open up a path, whereby they 

 might, by getting merchandize for ivory, avoid the guilt of selling 

 then children, I asked Monze, with about 150 of his men, if they 

 woidd like a white man to live amongst them and teach them. 

 All expressed high satisfaction at the prospect of the white man 

 and his path : they would protect both him and his property. I 

 asked the question, because it would be of great importance to 

 have stations in this healthy region, whither agents oppressed 

 by sickness might retire, and which would serve, moreover, as 

 part of a chain of communication between the interior and the 

 coast. The answer does not mean much more than what I know, 

 by other means, to be the case, — that a white man of good 

 sense would be welcome and safe in all these parts. By upright- 

 ness, and laying himself out for the good of the people, he 

 would be known all over the country as a benefactor of the race. 

 None desire Christian instruction, for of it they have no idea. 

 But the people are now humbled by the scourgings they have 

 received, and seem to be in a favourable state for the reception 

 of the Gospel. The gradual restoration of their former pros- 

 perity in cattle, simultaneously with instruction, would operate 

 beneficially upon their minds. The language is a dialect of the 

 other negro languages in the great valley ; and as many of 

 the Batoka living under the Makololo understand both it and 

 the Sichuana, missionaries could soon acquire it through that 

 medium. 



Monze had never been visited by any white man, but had seen 

 black native traders, who, he said, came for ivory, not for slaves. 

 He had heard of white men passing far to the east of him to 



