"It is to the Wangwana that Livingstone, Burton, Speke, and Grant owe, in great part, the accomplishment of their objects, and while in the employ of those explorers, this race rendered great services to geography. From a considerable distance north of the equator down to the Zambezi and across Africa to Benguella and the mouth of the Congo, or Livingstone, they have made their names familiar to tribes who, but for the Wangwana, would have remained ignorant to this day of all things outside their own settlements. They possess, with many weaknesses, many fine qualities. While very superstitious, easily inclined to despair, and readily giving ear to vague, unreasonable fears, they may also, by judicious management, be induced to laugh at their own credulity and roused to a courageous attitude, to endure like stoics, and fight like heroes. It will depend altogether upon the leader of a body of such men whether their worst or best qualities shall prevail. [Illustration: NATIVE WATER-CARRIER, ZANZIBAR.] "There is another class coming into notice from the interior of Africa, who, though of a sterner nature, will, I am convinced, as they are better known, become greater favorites than the Wangwana. I refer to the Wanyamwezi, or the natives of Unyamwezi, and the Wasukuma, or the people of Usukuma. Naturally, being a grade less advanced towards civilization than the Wangwana, they are not so amenable to discipline as the latter. While explorers would in the present state of acquaintance prefer the Wangwana as escort, the Wanyamwezi are far superior as porters. Their greater freedom from diseases, their greater strength and endurance, the pride they take in their profession of porters, prove them born travellers of incalculable use and benefit to Africa. If kindly treated, I do not know more docile and good-natured creatures. Their skill in war, tenacity of purpose, and determination to defend the rights of their elected chief against foreigners, have furnished themes for song to the bards of Central Africa. The English discoverer of Lake Tanganika and, finally, I myself have been equally indebted to them, both on my first and last expeditions. "From their numbers, and their many excellent qualities, I am led to think that the day will come when they will be regarded as something better than the 'best of pagazis;' that they will be esteemed as the good subjects of some enlightened power, who will train them up as the nucleus of a great African nation, as powerful for the good of the Dark Continent, as they threaten, under the present condition of things, to be for its evil."