They Continued At This Labor
Until The Whole Of The Goods Were Expended, And By This Means
About 130 Lbs.
Of gold were annually produced.
Probably more than this
was actually obtained, but, as it was an article easily secreted,
this alone was submitted to the authorities for taxation.
At present the whole amount of gold obtained annually by the Portuguese
is from 8 to 10 lbs. only. When the slave-trade began, it seemed to many
of the merchants a more speedy mode of becoming rich to sell off the slaves
than to pursue the slow mode of gold-washing and agriculture,
and they continued to export them until they had neither hands to labor
nor to fight for them. It was just the story of the goose and the golden egg.
The coffee and sugar plantations and gold-washings were abandoned,
because the labor had been exported to the Brazils. Many of the Portuguese
then followed their slaves, and the government was obliged
to pass a law to prevent further emigration, which, had it gone on,
would have depopulated the Portuguese possessions altogether.
A clever man of Asiatic (Goa) and Portuguese extraction, called Nyaude,
now built a stockade at the confluence of the Luenya and Zambesi;
and when the commandant of Tete sent an officer with his company
to summon him to his presence, Nyaude asked permission of the officer
to dress himself, which being granted, he went into an inner apartment,
and the officer ordered his men to pile their arms.
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