As Far Back As We Can Trace They Have Done
This, And They Still Do It As Heretofore.
The whole of their
country ranges from 3000 to 4000 feet above the sea-level - a high
plateau, studded with little outcropping hills of granite,
between which, in the valleys, there are numerous fertilising
springs of fresh water, and rich iron ore is found in sandstone.
Generally industrious - much more so than most other negroes - they
cultivate extensively, make cloths of cotton in their own looms,
smelt iron and work it up very expertly, build tembes to live in
over a large portion of their country, but otherwise live in
grass huts, and keep flocks and herds of considerable extent.
The Wanyamuezi, however, are not a very well-favoured people in
physical appearance, and are much darker than either the Wazaramo
or the Wagogo, though many of their men are handsome and their
women pretty; neither are they well dressed or well armed, being
wanting in pluck and gallantry. Their women, generally, are
better dressed than the men. Cloths fastened round under the
arms are their national costume, along with a necklace of beads,
large brass or copper wire armlets, and a profusion of thin
circles, called sambo, made of the giraffe's tail-hairs bound
round by the thinnest iron or copper wire; whilst the men at home
wear loin-cloths, but in the field, or whilst travelling, simply
hang a goat-skin over their shoulders, exposing at least three-
fourths of their body in a rather indecorous manner.
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