360 CARRIERS BY COMPULSION. 



perched on the tops of many of the hillocks, looked as if 

 the owners possessed an eye for the romantic, but they 

 were probably influenced more by the desire to overlook 

 their gardens, and keep their families out of the reach of 

 the malaria, which is supposed to prevail most on the banks 

 of the numerous little streams which run among the hills. 

 We were most kindly received by the Commandant, 

 lieutenant Antonio Canto e Castro, a young gentleman 

 whose whole subsequent conduct will ever make me regard 

 him with great affection. Like every other person of 

 intelligence whom I had met, he lamented deeply the 

 neglect with which this fine country has been treated. 

 This district contained, by the last census, 26,000 hearths, 

 or fires ; and if to each hearth we reckon four souls, we 

 have a population of 104,000. The number of carre- 

 gadores (carriers) who may be ordered out at the pleasure 

 of Government to convey merchandise to the coast is 

 in this district alone about 6,000, yet there is no good road 

 in existence. This system of compulsory carriage of 

 merchandise was adopted in consequence of the increase 

 in numbers and activity of our cruisers, which took place 

 in 1845. Each trader who went, previous to that year, 

 into the interior, in the pursuit of his calling, proceeded 

 on the plan of purchasing ivory and bees' -wax, and a 

 sufficient number of slaves to carry these commodities. 

 The whole were intended for exportation as soon as the 

 trader reached the coast. But when the more stringent 

 measures of 1845 came into operation, and rendered the 

 exportation of slaves almost impossible, there being no 

 roads proper for the employment of wheel conveyances, 

 this new system of compulsory carriage of ivory and 

 bees '-wax to the coast was resorted to by the Govern- 

 ment of Loanda. A trader who requires two or three 

 hundred carriers to convey his merchandise to the coast, 

 now applies to the General Government for aid. An order 

 is sent to the Commandant of a district to furnish the 

 number required. Kach head-man of the villages to whom 

 the order is transmitted, must furnish from five to twenty 

 or thirty men, according to the proportion that his people 

 bear to the entire population of the district. For this 

 accommodation the trader must pay a tax to the Govern- 

 ment of 1 ,000 reis, or about three shillings per load carried. 

 The trader is obliged to pay the carrier also the sum of 

 50 reis, or about twopence a day, for his sustenance. And 



