358 THE BABISA. Chap. XIII. 



accustomed to the dark inside to see him. He has a 

 Jewish cast of countenance, or rather the ancient Assyrian 

 face, as seen in the monuments brought to the British 

 Museum by Mr. Layard. This form of face is very com- 

 mon in this country, and leads to the belief that the true 

 type of the negro is not that met on the West Coast, from 

 which most people have derived their ideas of the African. 



Chinsamba had many Abisa or Babisa in his stockade, 

 and it was chiefly by the help of their muskets that he 

 had repulsed the Mazitu : these Babisa are great travellers 

 and traders. 



We liked Chinsamba very well, and found that he was 

 decidedly opposed to our risking our lives by going 

 further to the N.W. The Mazitu were believed to occupy 

 all the hills in that direction, so we spent the 4th of 

 September with him. 



It is rather a minute thing to mention, and it will 

 only be understood by those who have children of their 

 own, but the cries of the little ones, in their infant 

 sorrows, are the same in tone, at different ages, here as all 

 over the world. We have been perpetually reminded of 

 home and family by the wailings which were once familiar 

 to parental ears and heart, and felt thankful that to the 

 sorrows of childhood our children would never have super- 

 added the heartrending woes of the slave-trade. 



Taking Chinsamba's advice to avoid the Mazitu in 

 their marauding, we started on the 5th September away 

 to the N.E., and passed mile after mile of native cornfields, 

 with an occasional cotton-patch. 



After a long march, we passed over a waterless plain 

 about N.N.W. of the hills of Tsenga to a village on the 

 Lake, and thence up its shores to Chitanda. The banks 

 of the Lake were now crowded with fugitives, who had 

 collected there for the poor protection which the reeds 

 afforded. For miles along the water's edge was one 



