CHEAP IVORY. 
52 
many guns and kegs of powder ? If they have 200 or 300 
muskets, and ammunition in proportion, they think success 
is certain. No trader having ever before entered Manyema, 
the value of ivory was quite unknown ; indeed, the tusks 
were left in the forest with the other bones, where the ani- 
mals had been slain. Many were rotten ; others, gnawed 
by a rodent animal to sharpen its teeth, as London vats do 
on leaden pipes If civilly treated, the people went into 
the forests to spots where they knew elephants had been 
killed, either by traps or spears, and bought the tusks for 
a few copper bracelets. I have seen parties return with so 
much ivory that they carried it by three relays of hundreds 
of slaves, but even this does not satisfy human greed. 
The Manyema were found to bo terrified by the report of 
guns. Some I know consider them to be supernatural, for 
when tho effects of a musket ball were shown on a goat, 
they looked up to the clouds, and offered to bring ivory to 
buy the charm by which lightning was brought from the 
skies. When a village was assaulted, the men fled in terror, 
and the women and children were captured. Many of the 
Manyema women, especially far down the Lualaba, are very 
pretty, light colored, and lovely. It was common to hear 
the Zanzibar slaves — whose faces resemble the features of 
London door-knockers, which some atrocious iron founder 
thought were like those of lions — say to each other : “ Oh ! 
if wc had Manyema wives, what pretty children we should 
get ! ” Manyema men and women were all vastly'’ superior 
to the slaves, who evidently felt the inferiority they had 
acquired by wallowing in the mire of bondage. Many' of 
tho man were tall, strapping fellows, with but little of what 
we think distinctive of tho negro about them. If one relied 
on the teachings of phrenology, the Manyema men would 
take a high place in tho human family. They felt their 
superiority, and often said, truly, “ Were it not for tho 
firearms, not one of the strangers would ever leave our 
country ! ” If a comparison were instituted, and Manyema, 
taken at random, placed opposite, say the members of the 
