Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo, Volume 2 — John Shaqi
Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo, Volume 2Burton, Richard Francis, Sir
History
Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo, Volume 2
Burton, Richard Francis, Sir
Africa, West -- Description and travel; Congo River -- Description and travel; Ethnology -- Africa, West
Tom Peter offered to show us other relics of the past if we would
give him two days. A little party was soon made up, Mr. J. C.
Bigley, the master, and Mr. Richards, the excellent gunner of the
"Griffon," were my companions. We set out in a south-by-easterly
direction to the bottom of Sonho, or Diogo's Bay, which Barbot
calls "Bay of Pampus Rock." Thence we entered Alligator River, a
broad lagoon, the Raphael Creek of Maxwell's map, not named in
the hydrographic chart of 1859. Leading south with many a bend,
it is black water and thick, fetid mud, garnished with scrubby
mangrove, where Kru-boys come to cut fuel and catch fever; here
the dew seemed to fall in cold drops. After nine miles we reached
a shallow fork, one tine of which, according to our informants,
comes from the Congo Grande, or São Salvador, distant a week's
march. Leaving the whaler in charge of a Kru-man, we landed, and
walked about half a mile over loose sand bound by pine-apple
root, to the Banza Sonho, or, as we call it, King Antonio's Town-
-not to be mistaken for that placed in the charts behind Point
Padron. Our object being unknown, there was fearful excitement in
the thatched huts scattered under the palm grove, till Tom Peter
introduced us, and cleared for us a decent hut. The buildings, if
they can be so called, are poor and ragged, copies of those which
we shall see upon the uplands. Presently we were visited by the
king named after that saint "of whom the Evil One was parlous
afraid." This descendant of the "Counts of Sonho," in his dirty
night-cap and long coat of stained red cloth, was a curious
contrast to the former splendour of the "count's habit," with cap
of stitched silk which could be worn only by him and his nobles,
fine linen shirt, flowered silk cloak, and yellow stockings of
the same material. When King Affonso III. gave audience to the
missioners (A.D. 1646), the negro grandee "had on a vest of cloth
set with precious stones, and in his hat a crown of diamonds,
besides other stones of great value. He sat on a chair under a
canopy of rich crimson velvet, with gilt nails, after the manner
of Europe; and under his feet was a great carpet, with two stools
of the same colour, and silk laced with gold." After the usual
palaver we gave the black earl a cloth and bottle of rum for
leave to pass on, but no one would accompany us that evening, all
pretending that they wanted time to fit up the hammocks. At night
a body of armed bushmen marched down to inspect us.
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