588 TETE STREETS AND HOUSES. 



me to remain with him until the following month. He also 

 generously presented my men with abundant provisions 

 of millet ; and by giving them lodgings in a house of his 

 own, until they could erect their own huts, he preserved 

 them from the bite of the tampans, here named Cara- 

 patos.* We had heard frightful accounts of this insect 

 among the Banyai, and Major Sicard assured me that 

 to strangers its bite is more especially dangerous, as it 

 sometimes causes fatal fever. It may please our homoeo- 

 pathic friends to hear that, in curing the bite of the 

 tampan, the natives administer one of the insects bruised 

 in the medicine employed. 



The village of Tete is built on a long slope down to the 

 river, the fort being close to the water. The rock beneath 

 is grey sandstone, and has the appearance of being crushed 

 away from the river : the strata have thus a crumpled 

 form. The hollow between each crease is a street, the 

 houses being built upon the projecting fold. The rocks 

 at the top of the slope are much higher than the fort, 

 and of course completely command it. There is then a 

 large valley, and beyond that, an oblong hill called 

 Karueira. The whole of the adjacent country is rocky 

 and broken, but every available spot is under cultivation. 

 The stone houses in Tete are cemented with mud instead 

 of lime, and thatched with reeds and grass. The rains, 

 having washed out the mud between the stones, give all 

 the houses a rough, untidy appearance. No lime was 

 known to be found, nearer than Mozambique ; some 

 used in making seats in the verandahs, had actually been 

 brought all that distance. The Portuguese, evidently, 

 knew nothing of the pink and white marbles, which I 

 found at the Mbai, and another rivulet, named the Un- 

 guesi, near it, and of which I brought home specimens ; 



* Another insect, resembling a maggot, burrows into the feet of 

 the natives and sucks their blood. Mr. Westwood says, " The tampan 

 is a large species of mite, closely allied to the poisonous bug (as it is 

 called) of Persia, Argos reflexus, respecting which such marvellous 

 accounts have been recorded, and which the statement respecting the 

 carapato or tampan would partially confirm.'*' Mr. W. also thinks 

 that the poison-yielding larvae called N'gwa is a "species of chryso- 

 melidae. The larvae of the British species of that family exude a fetid 

 yellow thickish fluid when alarmed, but he has not heard that any of 

 them are at all poisonous." 



