328 EXTORTIONATE DEMANDS. 



These slave-traders have always been very much at the 

 mercy of the chiefs through whose country they have 

 passed ; for if they afforded a ready asylum for runaway 

 slaves, the traders might be deserted at any moment, 

 and stripped of their property altogether. They are thus 

 obliged to curry favour with the chiefs, so as to get a safe 

 conduct from them. The same system is adopted to 

 induce the chiefs to part with their people, whom all 

 feel to be the real source of their importance m the country. 

 On the return of the traders from the interior with chains 

 of slaves, it is so easy for a chief who may be so disposed 

 to take away a chain of eight or ten unresisting slaves, 

 that the merchant is fain to give any amount of presents 

 in order to secure the good will of the rulers. The in- 

 dependent chiefs, not knowing why their favour is so 

 eagerly sought, become excessively proud and super- 

 cilious in their demands, and look upon white men with 

 the greatest contempt. To such lengths did the Bangala. 

 a tribe near to which we had now approached, proceed, 

 a few years ago, that they compelled the Portuguese 

 traders to pay for water, wood, and even grass, and every 

 possible pretext was invented for levying fines ; and 

 these were patiently submitted to so long as the slave- 

 trade continued to flourish. We had unconsciously 

 come in contact with a system which was quite unknown 

 in the country from which my men had set out. An 

 English trader may there hear a demand for payment 

 of guides, but never, so far as I am aware, is he asked to 

 pay for leave to traverse a country. The idea does not 

 seem to have entered the native mind, except through 

 slave-traders, for the aborigines all acknowledge that the 

 untilled land, not needed for pasturage, belongs to God 

 alone, and that no harm is done by people passing through 

 it. I rather believe that, wherever the^slave-trade has not 

 penetrated, the visits of strangers are esteemed a real 

 privilege. 



The village of old Ionga Panza (lat. io° 25' S., long. 

 20 15' B.) is small and embowered in lofty evergreen 

 trees, which were hung around with fine festoons of 

 creepers. He sent us food immediately, and soon after- 

 wards a goat, which was considered a handsome gift, 

 there being but few domestic animals, though the country 

 is well adapted for them. I suspect this, like the country 

 of Shinte and Katema, must have been a tsetse district, 



