Chap. XXVII. FRIENDLY FEELINGS TOWARDS EUROPEANS. 555 
battle-axe in her hand, and helped her husband to scream. She 
was much excited, for she had never seen a white man before. 
We rather hked Monze, for he soon felt at home amongst us, and 
kept up conversation during much of the day. One head-man of 
a village after another arrived, and each of them supphed us 
hberally with maize, ground-nuts, and corn. Monze gave us a goat 
and a fowl, and appeared highly satisfied with a present of some 
handkercliiefs I had got in my supphes left at the island. Being 
of printed cotton, they excited great admiration; and when I put 
a gaudy-coloured one as a shawl about Ms child, he said that he 
would send for all Ms people to make a dance about it. In 
telling them that my object was to open up a path, whereby they 
might, by getting merchandize for ivory, avoid the guilt of selling 
their children, I asked Monze, with about 150 of Ms men, if they 
would hke a wMte man to live amongst them and teach them. 
All expressed high satisfaction at the prospect of the white man 
and Ms path: they would protect both him and his property. I 
asked the question, because it would be of great importance to 
have stations in this healthy region, wMther agents oppressed 
by sickness might retire, and wMch would serve, moreover, as 
part of a chain of communication between the interior and the 
coast. The answer does not mean much more than what I know, 
by other means, to be the case,—that a white man of good 
seme would be welcome and safe in all these parts. By upright¬ 
ness, and laymg himself out for the good of the people, he 
would be known aU over the country as a benefactor of the race. 
None desire Christian instruction, for of it they have no idea. 
But the people are now humbled by the scom'gings they have 
received, and seem to be in a favourable state for the reception 
of the Gospel. The gradual restoration of their former pros¬ 
perity in cattle, simultaneously vdth instruction, would operate 
beneficially upon their minds. The language is a dialect of the 
other negro languages m the great valley; and as many of 
the Batoka living under the Makololo understand both it and 
the Sichuana, missionaries could soon acquire it tMough that 
medium. 
Monze had never been visited by any wMte man, but had seen 
black native traders, who, he said, came for ivory, not for slaves. 
He had heard of white men passmg far to the east of him to 
