Joao Baptista and Antonio Jose,
having been sent by the first Portuguese trader that lived at Cassange,
actually returned from some of the Portuguese possessions in the East
with letters from the governor of Mozambique in the year 1815,
proving, as is remarked, "the possibility of so important a communication
between Mozambique and Loanda." This is the only instance
of native Portuguese subjects crossing the continent. No European
ever accomplished it, though this fact has lately been quoted
as if the men had been "PORTUGUESE".
Captain Neves was now actively engaged in preparing a present,
worth about fifty pounds, to be sent by Pombeiros to Matiamvo.
It consisted of great quantities of cotton cloth, a large carpet,
an arm-chair with a canopy and curtains of crimson calico, an iron bedstead,
mosquito curtains, beads, etc., and a number of pictures rudely painted in oil
by an embryo black painter at Cassange.
Matiamvo, like most of the natives in the interior of the country,
has a strong desire to possess a cannon, and had sent ten large tusks
to purchase one; but, being government property, it could not be sold:
he was now furnished with a blunderbuss, mounted as a cannon,
which would probably please him as well.
Senhor Graca and some other Portuguese have visited this chief
at different times; but no European resides beyond the Quango;
indeed, it is contrary to the policy of the government of Angola
to allow their subjects to penetrate further into the interior.
