396 MANGANJA FUGITIVES. Chap. XIX. 



the river ; leaving the Ajawa sitting under a large baobab, 

 and the Manganja cursing them most energetically across 

 the river. 



On our way up, we had seen that the people of Zimika had 

 taken refuge on a long island in the Shire, where they had 

 placed stores of grain to prevent it falling into the hands of the 

 Ajawa ; supposing afterwards that the invasion and war were 

 past, they had removed back again to tne mainland on the 

 east, and were living in fancied security. On approaching 

 the Chief's village, which was built in the midst of a beau- 

 tiful grove of lofty wild-fig and palm trees, sounds of revelry 

 fell upon our ears. The people were having a merry time 

 — drumming, dancing, and drinking beer — while a powerful 

 enemy was close at hand, bringing death or slavery to every 

 one in the village. One of our men called out to several who 

 came to the bank to look at us, that the Ajawa were coming 

 and were even now at Mikena's village ; but they were dazed 

 with drinking, and took no notice of the warning. 



In passing a temporary village of Manganja fugitives, we 

 saw a poor fellow with his neck in a slave-stick, and landed 

 a few hundred feet below ; but when we walked up to the 

 spot at which he had been, he had vanished, and every one 

 denied having seen such a person there. Though suffering 

 so terribly from the slave-trade themselves, these Manganja 

 still patronized it. A man, near whose temporary hut we 

 slept among a crowd of fugitives, started even before sun- 

 rise, to sell a boy to some black Portuguese who were 

 purchasing slaves in a neighbouring village. The fortune 

 of war had brought tin's poor boy into the fellow's power, 

 and the heartlessness of the ruffian, who had himself suf- 

 fered the loss of everything by the slave-hunters, made us 

 look upon him and his race as without natural affection. 

 Selling each other, when on the point of perishing by 



