Chap. XXXI. FORMEE JESUIT ESTABLISHMENT. 
643 
is' a serious difficulty in the way of developing the resources of 
the country^ and might prove fatal to an unarmed expedition. 
If this desirable and most fertile field of enterprise is ever to be 
opened up^ men must proceed on a different plan from that 
which has been followed^ and I do not apprehend there would be 
much difficulty in commencing a new system, if those who 
undertook it insisted that it is not our custom to pay for a high¬ 
way which has not been made by man. The natives themselves 
would not deny that the river is free to those who do not trade 
in slaves. If, in addition to an open frank explanation,, a small 
subsidy were given to the paramount chief, the willing consent of 
aU the subordinates would soon be secured. 
On the 1st of April I went to see the site of a former establish¬ 
ment of the Jesuits, called Micombo, about ten miles S.E. of Tete. 
Like all their settlements I have seen, both judgment and taste 
had been employed in the selection of the site. A little stream 
of mineral water had been collected in a tank and conducted to 
their house, before which was a little garden for raising vegetables 
at times of the year when no rain falls. It is now buried in a 
deep shady grove of mango-trees. I was accompanied by 
Captain Nunes, whose great-grandfather, also a Captain in the 
time of the Marquis of Pombal, recefred sealed orders, to be 
opened only on a certain day. When that day arrived, he found 
the command to go with his company, seize all the Jesuits of this 
establishment, and march them as prisoners to the coast. The 
riches of the jffaternity, which were immense, were taken pos¬ 
session of by the state. Large quantities of gold had often been 
sent to their superiors at Goa, enclosed in images. The Jesuits 
here do not seem to have possessed the sympathies of the people 
as their bretliren in Angola did. They were keen traders in 
ivory and gold-dust. All praise their industry. Whatever they 
did, they did it with all their might, and probably their successful 
labours in securmg the chief part of the trade to themselves, had 
excited the envy of the laity. None of the natives here can read; 
and though the Jesuits are said to have translated some of the 
prayers into the language of the country, I was unable to obtain 
a copy. The only religious teachers now in this part of the 
country are two gentlemen of colour, natives of Goa. The 
one who officiates at Tete, named Pedro Antonio dWraujo, is a 
2 T 2 
