Chap. XXXI. TETE PLUNDEKED AND BUENT. G31 



submitted to the authorities for taxation. At present the whole 

 amount of gold obtained annually by the Portuguese is from 8 

 to 10 lbs. only. When the slave-trade began, it seemed to many 

 of the merchants a more speedy mode of becoming rich, to sell off 

 the slaves, than to pursue the slow mode of gold-washing and 

 agriculture, and they continued to export them, until they had 

 neither hands to labour nor to fight for them. It was just the 

 story of the goose and the golden egg. The coffee and sugar 

 plantations and gold-washings were abandoned, because the labour 

 had been exported to the Brazils. Many of the Portuguese then 

 followed their slaves, and the Government was obliged to pass a 

 law to prevent further emigration, which, had it gone on, would 

 have depopulated the Portuguese possessions altogether. A clever 

 man of Asiatic (Goa) and Portuguese extraction, called Nyaude, 

 now built a stockade at the confluence of the Luenya and Zambesi ; 

 and when the Commandant of Tete sent an officer with his com- 

 pany to summon him to his presence, Nyaude asked permission of 

 the officer to dress himself, which being granted, he went into an 

 inner apartment, and the officer ordered his men to pile their arms. 

 A drum of war began to beat a note which is well known to the 

 inhabitants. Some of the soldiers took the alarm on hearing this 

 note, but the officer, disregarding their warning, was, with his whole 

 party, in a few minutes disarmed and bound hand and foot. The 

 Commandant of Tete then armed the whole body of slaves and 

 marched against the stockade of Nyaude, but when they came 

 near to it, there was the Luenya still to cross. As they did not 

 effect this speedily, Nyaude despatched a strong party under his 

 son Bonga across the river below the stockade, and up the left 

 bank of the Zambesi until they came near to Tete. They then 

 attacked Tete, which was totally undefended save by a few 

 soldiers in the fort, plundered and burned the whole town except 

 the house of the Commandant and a few others, with the church 

 and fort. The women and children fled into the church, and it is 

 a remarkable fact, that none of the natives of this region will ever 

 attack a church. Having rendered Tete a ruin, Bonga carried off 

 all the cattle and plunder to his father. News of this having 

 been brought to the army before the stockade, a sudden panic dis- 

 persed the whole ; and as the fugitives took roundabout ways in 

 their flight, Katolosa, who had hitherto pretended to be friendly 



