628 
GENEROSITY OF THE COMMANDANT. Chap. XXXI. 
CHAPTEE XXXI. 
Kind reception from the Commandant — His generosity to my men — The 
village of Tete — The population — Distilled spirits — The fort— Cause of 
the decadence of Portuguese power — Former trade— Slaves employed in 
gold-washing — Slave-trade drained the country of lahourers — The rebel 
Nyaude’s stockade — He burns Tete — Kisaka’s revolt and ravages — 
Extensive field of sugar-cane — The Commandant’s good reputation among 
the natives — Providential guidance — Seams of coal — A hot spring — 
Picturesque country — Water-carriage to the coal-fields — Workmen’s 
wages — Exports — Price of provisions — Visit gold-washings — The pro¬ 
cess of obtaining the precious metal — Coal within a gold-field — Present 
from Major Sicard — Natives raise wheat, &c. — Liberality of the Com¬ 
mandant — Geographical information from Senhor Candido — Earthquakes 
— Native ideas of a Supreme Being ■— Also of the immortality and trans¬ 
migration of souls — Fondness for display at funerals — Trade restrictions 
— Former Jesuit establishment— State of religion and education at Tete 
— Inundation of the Zambesi — Cotton cultivated—The fibrous plants 
conge and buaze—Detained by fever — The Kumbanzo bark — Native 
medicines — Iron, its quality — Hear of famine at Kilimane — Death of a 
Portuguese lady — The funeral — Disinterested kindness of the Portuguese. 
I WAS most kindly received by tlie Commandant Tito Augusto 
d’Araujo Sicard, who did everything in his power to restore me 
from my emaciated condition ; and as this was still the unhealthy 
period at Kilimane, he advised 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 pre¬ 
served them from the bite of the tampans, here named Carapatos.* 
We had heard frightful accounts of this insect wliile among the 
* 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 larv£e called N’gwa is a “ species of chryso- 
melidje. The larv£e 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.” 
