Slavery And Immorality Have Here Done Their Work;
Nowhere Else Does The European Name Stand At So Low An Ebb; But What
Can Be Expected?
Few Portuguese women are ever taken to the colonies,
and here I did not observe that honorable regard for the offspring
which I noticed in Angola.
The son of a late governor of Tete
was pointed out to me in the condition and habit of a slave.
There is neither priest nor school at Senna, though there are
ruins of churches and convents.
On passing the Shire we observed great quantities of the plant Alfacinya,
already mentioned, floating down into the Zambesi. It is probably
the `Pistia stratiotes', a gigantic "duck-weed". It was mixed
with quantities of another aquatic plant, which the Barotse named "Njefu",
containing in the petiole of the leaf a pleasant-tasted nut.
This was so esteemed by Sebituane that he made it part of his tribute
from the subjected tribes. Dr. Hooker kindly informs me
that the njefu "is probably a species of `Trapa', the nuts of which
are eaten in the south of Europe and in India. Government derives
a large revenue from them in Kashmir, amounting to 12,000 Pounds per annum
for 128,000 ass-loads! The ancient Thracians are said to have
eaten them largely. In the south of France they are called water-chestnuts."
The existence of these plants in such abundance in the Shire
may show that it flows from large collections of still water.
We found them growing in all the still branches and lagoons of the Leeambye
in the far north, and there also we met a beautiful little floating plant,
the `Azolla Nilotica', which is found in the upper Nile.
They are seldom seen in flowing streams.
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