MOS AMBIQUE. 
81 
a half crosade per day. These charges, with fees to secretaries, 
&c. may be computed altogether to amount to twenty-five per 
cent. 
The few following remarks on the trade, which may enable 
the reader to form a tolerably correct though not a very favoura- 
ble estimate of the commerce of Mosambique, will conclude my 
account of this Settlement. 
By the advice of one of the principal merchants, Captain Wea- 
therhead opened a store soon after his arrival, and landed samples 
of his goods, consisting of iron bars, gunpowder, pistols, blunder- 
busses, hard-ware, broad cloths, muslins. Cape wine and brandy, 
and some small bottles of scented waters. The government 
bought the whole of the two first articles, (the former at three 
dollars and a half per arob of 321 bs. English, and the latter at 
thirty-five Spanish dollars per barrel) ; the rest of the articles, 
except the Cape wine, brandy, and broad cloths, met with a very 
slack sale, which Captain Weatherhead in a great measure attri- 
jbuted to the departure of the annual fleet* for India having taken 
place, which had drained the traders of the greater part of their 
ready money. He seemed notwithstanding to entertain the opi- 
nion that a small cargo might be disposed of to good advantage 
in the months of April, May and June ; and in his Journal he 
remarks : the articles most suitable would be iron in barsy 
lead, powder, shot, iron-hoops, cutlery, stationary, prints and 
framed pictures, a small quantity of household furniture, printed 
cottons for sophas, silk and cotton stockings for ladies and gen- 
* The India fleet generally arrives at Mosambique early in Apri!, and returns in 
August. 
