44 AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
comes from still further off towards the Cape of Good 
Hope, from another kingdom subject to this King 
of Benamatapa, who is a great lord, and holds many 
t ler km 0 s as his subjects, and many other lands, 
which extend far inland, both towards the Cape of 
Good Hope and towards Mozambich. And in this 
town he is each day served with large presents, which 
the kings and lords, his subjects, send to him ; and 
when they bring them, they carry them bareheaded 
through all the city, until they arrive at the palace, 
from whence the king sees them come from a window, 
and he orders them to be taken up from there, and the 
bearers do not see him, but only hear his words ; and 
afterwards, he bids them call the persons who have 
brought these presents, and he dismisses them. This 
king constantly takes with him into the field a captain, 
whom they call Sono, with a great quantity of men-at- 
arms, and amongst them they bring six thousand women, 
who also bear arms and fight. With these forces he 
goes about subduing and pacifying whatever kings rise 
up or desire to revolt. The said King of Benamatapa 
sends, each year, many honourable persons throughout 
his kingdoms to all the towns and lordships, to give 
them new regulations, so that all may do them obeisance, 
which is in this manner : each one of the envoys comes 
to a town, and bids the people extinguish all the fires 
that there are in it; and after they have been put out, 
all the inhabitants go to this man who has been sent as 
commissary, to get fresh fire from him in sign of sub¬ 
jection and obedience ; and, whoever should not do this 
is held as a rebel, and the king immediately sends the 
number of people that are necessary to destroy him, 
and these pass through all the towns at their expense; 
their rations are meat, rice, and oil of sesame.” 
Very wonderful are the descriptions given by later 
writers of the palace of the emperor, probably greatly 
exaggerated. The gigantic ruins which have been dis¬ 
covered at Zimbabye, in Mashonaland, may possibly 
have been the palace of a former king, but this was 
more likely to have been a fortress, built, possibly, by 
