Read Ebook: Stand By The Union by Optic Oliver Bridgman L J Lewis Jesse Illustrator

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 1576 lines and 70814 words, and 32 pages

The country from the Bengo to Loanda rises suddenly, and the coast line is high and bold, but the soil is very arid and sandy, the rocks being arenaceous, evidently of recent formation, and full of casts of shells.

The exquisitely coloured roller is also very common in the arid country surrounding Loanda.

The pretty runners are also seen in little flocks on the sandy plains, and are most elegant in their carriage as they swiftly run along the ground. Two or three species of bustards are also common.

The great road from the interior skirts the River Bengo for some miles to the bar, where it turns south to Loanda; and the last resting or sleeping place for the natives carrying produce is at a place called Quifandongo, consisting of a row of grog-shops and huts on either side of the road.

It is a curious sight to see hundreds of carriers from the interior lying down on the ground in the open air, each asleep with his load by his side. A march of two hours brings them to a slope leading down to the bay, at the end of which Loanda is built.

CITY OF LOANDA--NATIVES--SLAVERY--CONVICTS--THEATRE AND MORALS.

The city of St. Paul de Loanda is situated in a beautiful bay, backed by a line of low, sandy cliff that at its southern end sweeps outward with a sharp curve, and terminates at the water's edge in a bold point, on which is perched the Fort of San Miguel .

The "Cidade Baixa," or lower town, is built on the shore of the bay, on the flat sandy ground thus enclosed on the land side.

The "Cidade Alta," or high town, is built on the high ground, at the end of which stands the fort above named.

In front of the bay a long, low, and very narrow spit of pure sand stretches like a natural break-water, and protects the harbour of Loanda perfectly from the waves and surf of the ocean.

A small opening called the Barra da Corimba, about a mile south of Loanda, breaks the end of this long spit into an island; the rest joins the mainland about twelve miles to the south.

The whole length of the spit is very low and narrow, so that in high tides the waves break over it in places, but, singular to say, it has never been washed away at any place.

The bay was formerly much deeper;--vessels could anchor quite near the town, and could pass out of the Barra da Corimba, but now they have to anchor about a couple of miles to the north of the town, and boats only can pass over this bar.

A number of huts inhabited by native fishermen are built on the island, also a few houses belonging to the Portuguese, who are fond of going over to it for the purpose of bathing in the open sea beyond. The cocoanut-palm tree thrives very well on this sandy spit, but only a comparatively small number are growing on it.

Some years ago the Government sent to Goa for a Portuguese planter to plant this valuable palm, and to teach the natives its cultivation. On his arrival he was only afforded means to sow a very small number, and was then appointed postmaster of Loanda, an office he held for many years, till his death, and I do not believe that a single cocoa-palm has been planted since, either by Government or private individuals; and thus a valuable and easy branch of cultivation and source of wealth is entirely neglected.

Loanda contains about 10,000 or 12,000 inhabitants, of whom about one-third are whites. The houses are generally large and commodious, built of stone, and roofed with red tiles; blue is a favourite colour for painting window-sills, door-posts, &c., and gives a very pretty appearance to the city. The greater part of the houses consist only of a ground floor,--the better class have a first, but rarely a second floor. Verandahs more or less open are the rule, in which it is customary to take meals.

Not many houses have been built within the last few years; they mostly date from the time when Loanda was a wealthy city, and the chief shipping port for slaves to the Brazils, when as many as twelve or fifteen vessels were to be seen at a time taking in their cargoes of blacks. The slavers on their way out to Loanda used to bring timber from Rio de Janeiro for the rafters and flooring of the houses, and so hard and durable was it that it can be seen at the present day in the old buildings, as perfect and sound as when first put down, resisting perfectly the white ant, beetle larvae, dry rot, and mildew that soon attack and destroy native woods.

Loanda has improved immensely since I first landed there in February 1858. It was then in a very dilapidated and abandoned condition. No line of steamers communicating with Europe then existed; four and six months elapsed without a vessel arriving, except perhaps one from Rio de Janeiro with sugar and rum; the slave-trade had ceased there for some years, and hardly any trade in produce had been started, a little wax, ivory, and orchilla-weed, being almost the only exports.

There was no trade or navigation whatever on the River Quanza, and hardly any shops in the town, so that provisions and other necessaries were constantly exhausted and at famine prices. A large subsidy was granted to the colony by Portugal, to defray its expenses, always far in excess of its receipts. Now there is a monthly line of large steamers from Lisbon, another from Liverpool, and a considerable number of sailing-vessels constantly loading and discharging, to attest to the wonderful increase in the trade of the place. The colony now pays its own expenses, and shows a yearly surplus; and a couple of steamers running constantly from the River Quanza to Loanda can hardly empty the river of its produce.

All the public buildings are in an efficient state, a large extent of flat, stinking shore has been filled up and embanked, ruins of churches and monasteries cleared away, walks and squares laid out and planted, a large new market is being built, and good shops and stores are now abundantly supplied with every description of European goods; and if a good supply of water were brought to the city from the River Bengo, there would certainly not be a finer place to live in on the whole Western Coast of Africa.

From most of the houses having large yards, in which are the kitchens, stores, well, and habitations for the slaves and servants, the city is luckily very open, and there is as yet no overcrowding; the roads and streets are also wide and spacious. The principal street, running through the whole length of the town, is remarkably wide, and for some distance has a row of banyan trees in the centre, under the shade of which a daily market or fair is held of cloth and dry goods.

This is called a "quitanda," the native name for a market, and the sellers are almost all women, and are either free blacks, who trade on their own account, or are the slaves of other blacks, mulattoes, or whites.

Many of the natives and carriers from the interior prefer buying their cloth, crockery, &c., of these open-air retailers, to going into a shop.

Four sticks stuck in the ground, and a few "loandos," or papyrus mats, form a little hut or booth in which presides the fat and lazy negress vendor.

On the ground are laid out temptingly pieces of cotton, gaily coloured handkerchiefs, cheap prints, indigo stripes, and other kinds of cloths; "quindas," or baskets with balls and reels of cotton, seed-beads, needles, &c.; knives, plates, cups and saucers, mugs and jugs, looking-glasses, empty bottles, and a variety of other objects. At other stalls may be seen balls of white clay called "pemba," and of "tacula," a red wood of the same name rubbed to a fine paste with water on a rough stone, and dried in the sun. Resting against the trunks of the trees are long rolls of native tobacco, plaited like fine rope and wound round a stick, which a black is selling at the rate of a few inches for a copper coin, the measure being a bit of stick attached by a cord to the roll of tobacco, or round the neck of the black. Others sell clay tobacco-pipes and pipe-stems, and as all men and women smoke as much tobacco as they can afford, a thriving trade is driven in the fragrant weed. All the tobacco used by the natives is grown in the country; but little is imported from abroad, and this is mostly purchased by the Portuguese for the weekly allowance which it is customary in Angola to make to the slaves.

"Diamba," or wild hemp for smoking, is also largely sold.

The women vendors at these booths are amongst the best-looking and cleanest to be seen in Loanda, and with often quite small and well-formed hands and feet; they are very sharp traders, and all squat or lie down at full length on the hot sand, enjoying the loud gossip and chatter so dear to the African women with their friends and customers.

A square at the back of the custom-house is the general market of Loanda, and presents a curious scene, from the great variety of articles sold, and the great excitement of buyers and sellers crying out their wares and making their purchases at the top of their voices. The vendors, here again, are mostly women, and, as no booths are allowed to be put up, they wear straw hats with wide brims, almost as large as an ordinary umbrella, to shade themselves. Every kind of delicacy to captivate the negro palate and fancy is to be had here:--wooden dishes full of small pieces of lean, measly-looking pork; earthen pots full of cooked beans and palm-oil, retailed out in small platters, at so much a large wooden spoonful, and eaten on the spot; horrible-looking messes of fish, cakes, and pastry, &c., everything thickly covered with black flies and large bluebottles; large earthen jars, called "sangas," and gourds full of "garapa," or indian-corn beer; live fowls and ducks, eggs, milk, Chili peppers, small white tomatoes, bananas, and, in the season, oranges, mangoes sour-sop, and other fruits, "quiavos," a few cabbage-leaves and vegetables, firewood, tobacco, pipes and stems, wild hemp, mats, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, palm and ground-nut oil, and dried and salt fish. The women squat on their heels, with their wares in front, all round and over the square, while hundreds of natives are jabbering and haggling over their bargains, as if their existence depended on their noisy exertions.

To the markets, especially, the black women take their dirty babies , and they let them roll about in the sand and rubbish, along with a swarm of children, mongrel dogs, and most miserable, lean, long-snouted pigs that turn over the garbage and quarrel for the choice morsels.

There are two other marketing places, one principally for fruit and firewood, the other where fried fish is the chief article, and where a number of negresses are always busy frying fish in oil in the open air. The natives swarm round to buy and eat the hot morsels which the greasy cooks are taking out of the hissing pans placed on stones on the ground over a wood fire,--these they put into wooden platters by their side, and then suck their oily fingers with their thick lips or rub them over their warm and perspiring faces and heads.

Loanda is most abundantly supplied with fish of many kinds, and fortunate it is for many of its inhabitants that the sea is so prodigal of its riches to them. The fish-market is an open space at the southern end of the town, under the cliff on which stands the Fort of San Miguel. Here, in the early morning and in the afternoon, come the fishermen with laden canoes and toss their cargoes on the sandy beach, loud with a perfect Babel of buyers and vendors. The smallest copper coin enables a native to buy enough fish for one day;--the crowd that collects daily at the fish-market, and the strange scene that it presents of noisy bustle, can therefore be imagined.

A number of women and children are always busy scaling and gutting fish, or cutting the large "pungos" and sharks into small pieces in large wooden tubs, where they lie slopping in their reddish, watery blood; others are frying fish, and roasting a fish like a herring, held in cleft sticks , six or seven in each, stuck upright in the sand all round a fire, or opening fish flat to dry in the sun for sale to the natives from the interior. The fish are caught, both in the bay and out at sea, with hook and line and with nets made of native-spun cotton.

The quantity of fish on the coast is incredible. I have often watched the bay at night to listen to the wonderful swishing noise made by the fish on the surface of the water, as they were scared by every flash of lightning. Steaming once into Ambriz Bay, its whole surface was alive and boiling, as it were, with fish. The captain of the steamer, who had in his lifetime been to all parts of the world, declared that he had never witnessed such a sight.

A small shark is often caught which is much esteemed by the natives, and is dried in the sun; also the "pungo," which attains to as much as a hundred pounds in weight. It is no unusual sight to see one slung on a stick passed through the gills and carried on the shoulders of two blacks, with the tail dragging on the ground. It has very large, flat scales, and the flesh is not at all coarse in flavour. Latterly, the Portuguese have salted this fish in barrels, and when I was last at Loanda I was told of one man who had already salted 2000, and the season was not then over. It is this fish that is said by the natives to make the very loud and extraordinary noise that one hears so plainly at night or early morning, when in a boat or ship; it is said to press its snout against the vessel and then make the curious sound. I have heard it so strongly and plainly when lying in a bunk on board steamers that I have no doubt whatever the fish must have been touching the side of the vessel, and I have seen the blacks at other times splashing the water with an oar, because the loud drumming of the pungo kept them awake when lying in the bottom of a barge. The sound is like a deep tremolo note on a harmonium, and is quite as loud, but as if played under water. This low, sustained note has a very strange effect when first heard so unexpectedly in the still water. It is a migratory fish, and comes in shoals on the coast only from about June to August.

Another fish like a small cod, called "corvina," is also migratory, visiting the coast from July to September, and appears to come from a northerly direction, as it is a month later in arriving at Mossamedes than it is at Benguella, a distance of about 160 miles.

Till quite lately the roads and streets of Loanda were of fine, loose, red sand, rendering walking difficult and uncomfortable, particularly in the daytime, when the sand becomes burning hot from the sun's rays; hence very few people ever walked even short distances, and the consequence was the constant recourse to the "maxilla" for locomotion. This is a flat frame of wood and cane-work, with one, or sometimes two arms at the side, and a low back provided with a cushion. This frame is hung by cords to hooks on a "bord?o," or palm-pole, about fifteen or eighteen feet long, and is carried by two blacks . It is a very comfortable and lazy contrivance, and the carriers take it easily at the rate of about three to four miles an hour. The maxilla is provided with a light painted waterproof cover, and with curtains to draw all round and effectually hide the inmate, if necessary. The Portuguese ladies were never seen walking out at any time, and when going to church, or paying visits, always went in a maxilla closely curtained that no one might see them. It is difficult to explain the reason for this, but I believe that a fear of Mrs. Grundy was at the bottom of it.

There is a very fair military band at Loanda, which plays twice a week in the high town, and once in a square near the bay. When I was last at Loanda with my wife, two other English ladies were also there with their husbands, and as we all listened to the band regularly, enjoying the cool evening promenade, we, no doubt, at first shocked the Portuguese greatly by so doing. It had at last, however, the good effect of bringing many of the Portuguese ladies out also, and they did not draw the curtains of their maxillas quite so closely as they used. An officer from Lisbon explained to my wife that the reason his countrywomen did not like to go about and be seen was that they were so ugly! But I can emphatically testify that this was an ill-natured libel on the white ladies of Loanda.

There is a commodious custom-house in the centre of the town. On the quay are some benches on which the merchants sit in the afternoon to discuss current events, and to retail the choice bits of scandal of the day. There are several large and roomy Roman Catholic churches in the lower town, at which the attendance, however, is not very great, except at some of the principal festivals. I once saw, in a procession from one of the churches, in carnival time, a number of little black girls dressed to represent angels, with white wings affixed to their backs, and intensely funny they looked. On these occasions, and also at weddings, christenings, &c., quantities of rockets are sent up in the daytime, no feast being considered complete without an abundant discharge of these fire-works, to the immense delight of the black juvenile population, who yell and scream like demons and throw and roll themselves about in the sand.

At several places may be seen open barbers' shops for the natives, distinguished by a curious sign, namely, two strips of blue cloth edged with red, about three or four feet long and six inches wide, stretched diagonally over the entrance . Inside, a chair covered with a clean white cotton cloth--with the threads at the ends pulled out for about four inches, to leave a lace-like design, called "crivo"--invites customers to enter and sit down, and have their heads shaved quite bare, the usual custom at Loanda, particularly of the negro women.

The dress of the blacks at Loanda is the same as elsewhere in Angola;--a cloth round the waist reaching to the knees or ankles and another thrown over the shoulders, or a cotton shirt, is the most common. Those who can afford it are fond of dressing in white man's costume of coat and trousers, but the grand ambition of all is to possess an ordinary chimney-pot hat, which is worn on special occasions, no matter whether the wearer be dressed in cloths or coat.

The costume of the black women of Loanda is hideous. An indigo black cotton cloth is folded round the body and envelopes it tightly from the armpits to the feet; another long piece of the same black cloth covers the head and is crossed over the bosom, or hangs down loosely over the shoulders, showing only the face and arms.

The correct costume is to have a striped, or other cotton cloth or print under the black cloths, but as only these latter are seen, the women have a dreadfully funereal appearance. The poorer class and slaves wear bright cotton prints, &c., and always a white or red handkerchief folded narrow and wound round the head very cleverly, suiting their dark skins remarkably well. A very common ornament round the forehead is a narrow strip of seed bead-work of different colours and patterns, and the women are fond of copying the large capital letters of the advertisements in the Portuguese newspapers, quite unconscious, of course, of the meaning of their pattern:--I once saw "Piannos para alugar" worked in beads round the head of a black woman.

The Loanda women have a singular habit of talking aloud to themselves as they walk along, which at first strikes a stranger very forcibly; the men do the same, but to nothing like the extent that the women do. All loads are carried by the women on their heads, in all parts of Angola, and the ease with which they balance anything on their shaven heads is wonderful. It is not difficult to understand that baskets or heavy loads can be easily balanced, but it is no uncommon thing to see women and girls walking along with a tea-cup, bottle, tumbler, or wine glass on their heads, and turning round and talking without the least fear of its dropping off. The manner in which they balance the "sangas," or earthen pots in which they carry water, is the most curious of all; these are large, and have round, rather pointed bottoms; a handkerchief is rolled round into a small cushion and put on the side of the head, and the "sanga" is placed on it, not quite on its bottom, but a little on one side.

Amongst the mulattoes and black women it is usual to send a fresh "cola" as a present, and there is a symbolical language expressed by the number of nicks made on it by the nail, of greeting, good wishes, &c.

A considerable quantity of "cola" was formerly exported to Rio de Janeiro from Loanda, packed in moist clay or earth to keep it fresh.

The abolition of slavery in the Portuguese possessions was decreed some years ago. The names of all the existing slaves had to be inscribed in the Government office as "Libertos," and the owners were obliged to supply them with proper food, clothing, and medicine, and were not allowed to punish them; while they, on their part, were required to work for seven years as compensation to their owners, at the expiration of which time they were to be free. This has been allowed to remain virtually a dead-letter, the slaves never having had the law explained to them, and the authorities not troubling themselves to enforce their liberation at the end of the seven years.

The complete abolition of slavery in Angola has, however, been decreed to take place in the year 1878; and should the measure be strictly enforced, the total annihilation and ruin of the thriving and rising cotton and sugar-cane plantations, &c., will be the result, with a vast amount of misery to the thousands of liberated blacks.

It is a pity that philanthropy should blindly put so sudden a stop to a custom that has existed from time immemorial, and of which the evils are, in a country like Angola, exceedingly slight. The effect of this measure will be to destroy its nascent industry, the only means for its progress and development, and will plunge a great part of its population into helpless misery for years to come. Let slavery be abolished by all means, but only in the most gradual manner, and in proportion to the industrial and moral advancement of the race.

The natives of Angola are specially fitted for the introduction of habits of industry and usages of civilization, as they are naturally of a peaceable, quiet, and orderly disposition. The difference between them and the natives of Sierra Leone and the rest of the West Coast is very striking and pleasing. They have none of the disgusting swagger, conceit, or cant of the former, but are invariably civil and kindly, and under a firm and enlightened policy they would become more really civilized and industrious than any other natives of the West Coast.

That such would be the case is abundantly proved by what has already been done under the Portuguese in Angola, notwithstanding the intolerable system of rapine and oppression which the natives have borne for so many years from their government, a system in which only quite recently has any improvement been noticed. Were the natives otherwise than inoffensive and incapable of enmity, they would long ago have swept away the rotten power of the Portuguese in that large extent of territory.

Two good paved roads lead from the lower to the upper town of Loanda; in this are the Governor's palace, the prison, the treasury and other public offices, the barracks, and the military and general hospital. This is the healthiest part of the town, being fully exposed to the strong sea breeze, and splendid views are obtained from it of the bay, shipping, and town to the north, and of the coast and the "Ilha" or island to the south.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet