immense crops of tall grass, here a nuisance, however valuable
e ewhere. A white cloud was often observed to rest on
the head of the column, as if a current of hot damp air
was sent up by the heat of the flames and its moisture was
condensed at the top. Rain did not follow, though theorists
have imagined that in such cases it ought.
Large game, buffaloes, and zebras, were abundant abreast
the island, but no men could be seen. On the mainland,
over on the right bank of the river, we were amused by the
eccentric gyrations and evolutions of flocks of small seed-
eating birds, who in their flight wheeled into compact
poumns with such military precision as to give us the
impression that they must be guided by a leader, and
aU directed by the same signal. Several other kinds of
sma birds now go in flocks, and among others the large
Senegal swallow. The presence of this bird, being clearly in
a state of migration from the north, while the 'common
swallow of the country, and the brown kite are away beyond
e equator, leads to the conjecture that there may be a
double migration, namely, of birds from torrid climates to the
more temperate, as this now is, as well as from severe
winters to sunny regions; but this could not be verified by
such birds of passage as ourselves.
On reaching Mazaro, the mouth of a narrow creek which
in floods communicates with the Quillimane river, we found
that the Portuguese were at war with a half-caste named
Manano alias Matakenya, from whom they had generally
fled, and who, having built a stockade near the mouth of
the Shire, owned all the country between that river and
Mazaro. Mariano was best known by his native name Matakenya,
which in their tongue means “ trembling,” or quivering
as trees do in a storm. He was a keen slave-hunter, and
kept a large number of men, well armed with muskets. I t
is an entire mistake to suppose that the slave-trade is one of
buying and selling alone; or that engagements can be made
with labourers in Africa as they are in India ; Mariano, like
other Portuguese, had no labour to spare. He had been in
the habit of sending out armed parties on slave huntmg-
forays among the helpless tribes to the north-east, and
carrying down the kidnapped victims in chains to Quilli-
mane, where they were sold by his brother-in-law Cruz
Coimbra, and shipped as “ Free emigrants ” to the French
island of Bourbon. So long as his robberies and murders
were restricted to the natives at a distance, the authorities
did not interfere; but his men, trained to deeds of violence
and bloodshed in their slave forays, naturally began to
practise on the people nearer at hand, though belonging
to the Portuguese, and even in the village of Senna, under
the guns of the fort. A gentleman of the highest standing
told us that, while at dinner with his family, it was no uncommon
event for a slave to rush into the room pursued
by one of Mariano’s men with spear in hand to murder him.
The atrocities of this villain, aptly termed by the late
governor of Quillimane a “ notorious robber and murderer,
became at length intolerable. All the Portuguese spoke of
him as a rare monster of inhumanity. I t is unaccountable
why half-castes, such as he, are so much more cruel than
the Portuguese, but such is undoubtedly the case.
I t was asserted that one of his favourite modes of creating
an impression in the country, and making his name dreaded,
was to spear his captives with his own hands. On one
occasion he is reported to have thus killed forty poor
wretches placed in a row before him. We did not at first
credit these statements, and thought that they were merely