CITY OF LOANDA--NATIVES--SLAVERY--CONVICTS--THEATRE AND MORALS.
The city of St. Paul de Loanda is situated in a beautiful bay, backed
by a line of low, sandy cliff that at its southern end sweeps outward
with a sharp curve, and terminates at the water’s edge in a bold point,
on which is perched the Fort of San Miguel (Plate X.).
The “Cidade Baixa,” or lower town, is built on the shore of the bay, on
the flat sandy ground thus enclosed on the land side.
The “Cidade Alta,” or high town, is built on the high ground, at the
end of which stands the fort above named.
In front of the bay a long, low, and very narrow spit of pure sand
stretches like a natural break-water, and protects the harbour of
Loanda perfectly from the waves and surf of the ocean.
[Illustration:
PLATE X.
VIEW OF THE CITY OF ST. PAUL DE LOANDA. _To face page 20._]
A small opening called the Barra (or bar) da Corimba, about a mile
south of Loanda, breaks the end of this long spit into an island; the
rest joins the mainland about twelve miles to the south.
The whole length of the spit is very low and narrow, so that in high
tides the waves break over it in places, but, singular to say, it has
never been washed away at any place.
The bay was formerly much deeper;--vessels could anchor quite near the
town, and could pass out of the Barra da Corimba, but now they have to
anchor about a couple of miles to the north of the town, and boats only
can pass over this bar.
A number of huts inhabited by native fishermen are built on the island,
also a few houses belonging to the Portuguese, who are fond of going
over to it for the purpose of bathing in the open sea beyond. The
cocoanut-palm tree thrives very well on this sandy spit, but only a
comparatively small number are growing on it.
Some years ago the Government sent to Goa for a Portuguese planter to
plant this valuable palm, and to teach the natives its cultivation.
On his arrival he was only afforded means to sow a very small number,
and was then appointed postmaster of Loanda, an office he held for many
years, till his death, and I do not believe that a single cocoa-palm
has been planted since, either by Government or private individuals;
and thus a valuable and easy branch of cultivation and source of wealth
is entirely neglected.
Loanda contains about 10,000 or 12,000 inhabitants, of whom about
one-third are whites. The houses are generally large and commodious,
built of stone, and roofed with red tiles; blue is a favourite colour
for painting window-sills, door-posts, &c., and gives a very pretty
appearance to the city. The greater part of the houses consist only of
a ground floor,--the better class have a first, but rarely a second
floor. Verandahs more or less open are the rule, in which it is
customary to take meals.
Not many houses have been built within the last few years; they mostly
date from the time when Loanda was a wealthy city, and the chief
shipping port for slaves to the Brazils, when as many as twelve or
fifteen vessels were to be seen at a time taking in their cargoes of
blacks. The slavers on their way out to Loanda used to bring timber
from Rio de Janeiro for the rafters and flooring of the houses, and so
hard and durable was it that it can be seen at the present day in the
old buildings, as perfect and sound as when first put down, resisting
perfectly the white ant, beetle larvæ, dry rot, and mildew that soon
attack and destroy native woods.
Loanda has improved immensely since I first landed there in February
1858. It was then in a very dilapidated and abandoned condition. No
line of steamers communicating with Europe then existed; four and six
months elapsed without a vessel arriving, except perhaps one from Rio
de Janeiro with sugar and rum; the slave-trade had ceased there for
some years, and hardly any trade in produce had been started, a little
wax, ivory, and orchilla-weed, being almost the only exports.
There was no trade or navigation whatever on the River Quanza, and
hardly any shops in the town, so that provisions and other necessaries
were constantly exhausted and at famine prices. A large subsidy was
granted to the colony by Portugal, to defray its expenses, always
far in excess of its receipts. Now there is a monthly line of large
steamers from Lisbon, another from Liverpool, and a considerable number
of sailing-vessels constantly loading and discharging, to attest to
the wonderful increase in the trade of the place. The colony now pays
its own expenses, and shows a yearly surplus; and a couple of steamers
running constantly from the River Quanza to Loanda can hardly empty the
river of its produce.
All the public buildings are in an efficient state, a large extent of
flat, stinking shore has been filled up and embanked, ruins of churches
and monasteries cleared away, walks and squares laid out and planted,
a large new market is being built, and good shops and stores are now
abundantly supplied with every description of European goods; and if
a good supply of water were brought to the city from the River Bengo,
there would certainly not be a finer place to live in on the whole
Western Coast of Africa.
From most of the houses having large yards, in which are the kitchens,
stores, well, and habitations for the slaves and servants, the city
is luckily very open, and there is as yet no overcrowding; the roads
and streets are also wide and spacious. The principal street, running
through the whole length of the town, is remarkably wide, and for some
distance has a row of banyan trees in the centre, under the shade of
which a daily market or fair is held of cloth and dry goods.
This is called a “quitanda,” the native name for a market, and the
sellers are almost all women, and are either free blacks, who trade on
their own account, or are the slaves of other blacks, mulattoes, or
whites.
Many of the natives and carriers from the interior prefer buying their
cloth, crockery, &c., of these open-air retailers, to going into a shop.
Four sticks stuck in the ground, and a few “loandos,” or papyrus mats,
form a little hut or booth in which presides the (generally) fat and
lazy negress vendor.
On the ground are laid out temptingly pieces of cotton, gaily
coloured handkerchiefs, cheap prints, indigo stripes, and other kinds
of cloths; “quindas,” or baskets with balls and reels of cotton,
seed-beads, needles, &c.; knives, plates, cups and saucers, mugs and
jugs, looking-glasses, empty bottles, and a variety of other objects.
At other stalls may be seen balls of white clay called “pemba,” and
of “tacula,” a red wood of the same name rubbed to a fine paste with
water on a rough stone, and dried in the sun. Resting against the
trunks of the trees are long rolls of native tobacco, plaited like fine
rope and wound round a stick, which a black is selling at the rate
of a few inches for a copper coin, the measure being a bit of stick
attached by a cord to the roll of tobacco, or round the neck of the
black. Others sell clay tobacco-pipes and pipe-stems, and as all men
and women smoke as much tobacco as they can afford, a thriving trade
is driven in the fragrant weed. All the tobacco used by the natives is
grown in the country; but little is imported from abroad, and this is
mostly purchased by the Portuguese for the weekly allowance which it is
customary in Angola to make to the slaves.
“Diamba,” or wild hemp for smoking, is also largely sold.
The women vendors at these booths are amongst the best-looking
and cleanest to be seen in Loanda, and with often quite small and
well-formed hands and feet; they are very sharp traders, and all
squat or lie down at full length on the hot sand, enjoying the loud
gossip and chatter so dear to the African women with their friends and
customers.
A square at the back of the custom-house is the general market of
Loanda, and presents a curious scene, from the great variety of
articles sold, and the great excitement of buyers and sellers crying
out their wares and making their purchases at the top of their voices.
The vendors, here again, are mostly women, and, as no booths are
allowed to be put up, they wear straw hats with wide brims, almost
as large as an ordinary umbrella, to shade themselves. Every kind
of delicacy to captivate the negro palate and fancy is to be had
here:--wooden dishes full of small pieces of lean, measly-looking pork;
earthen pots full of cooked beans and palm-oil, retailed out in small
platters, at so much a large wooden spoonful, and eaten on the spot;
horrible-looking messes of fish, cakes, and pastry, &c., everything
thickly covered with black flies and large bluebottles; large earthen
jars, called “sangas,” and gourds full of “garapa,” or indian-corn
beer; live fowls and ducks, eggs, milk, Chili peppers, small white
tomatoes, bananas, and, in the season, oranges, mangoes sour-sop, and
other fruits, “quiavos,” a few cabbage-leaves and vegetables, firewood,
tobacco, pipes and stems, wild hemp, mats, pumpkins, sweet potatoes,
palm and ground-nut oil, and dried and salt fish. The women squat
on their heels, with their wares in front, all round and over the
square, while hundreds of natives are jabbering and haggling over their
bargains, as if their existence depended on their noisy exertions.
To the markets, especially, the black women take their dirty babies
(they all seem to have babies, and the babies seem always dirty), and
they let them roll about in the sand and rubbish, along with a swarm
of children, mongrel dogs, and most miserable, lean, long-snouted pigs
that turn over the garbage and quarrel for the choice morsels.
There are two other marketing places, one principally for fruit and
firewood, the other where fried fish is the chief article, and where
a number of negresses are always busy frying fish in oil in the open
air. The natives swarm round to buy and eat the hot morsels which the
greasy cooks are taking out of the hissing pans placed on stones on the
ground over a wood fire,--these they put into wooden platters by their
side, and then suck their oily fingers with their thick lips or rub
them over their warm and perspiring faces and heads.
Loanda is most abundantly supplied with fish of many kinds, and
fortunate it is for many of its inhabitants that the sea is so
prodigal of its riches to them. The fish-market is an open space at
the southern end of the town, under the cliff on which stands the Fort
of San Miguel. Here, in the early morning and in the afternoon, come
the fishermen with laden canoes and toss their cargoes on the sandy
beach, loud with a perfect Babel of buyers and vendors. The smallest
copper coin enables a native to buy enough fish for one day;--the crowd
that collects daily at the fish-market, and the strange scene that it
presents of noisy bustle, can therefore be imagined.
A number of women and children are always busy scaling and gutting
fish, or cutting the large “pungos” and sharks into small pieces in
large wooden tubs, where they lie slopping in their reddish, watery
blood; others are frying fish, and roasting a fish like a herring,
held in cleft sticks (Plate XIV.), six or seven in each, stuck upright
in the sand all round a fire, or opening fish flat to dry in the sun
for sale to the natives from the interior. The fish are caught, both
in the bay and out at sea, with hook and line and with nets made of
native-spun cotton.
The quantity of fish on the coast is incredible. I have often watched
the bay at night to listen to the wonderful swishing noise made by the
fish on the surface of the water, as they were scared by every flash of
lightning. Steaming once into Ambriz Bay, its whole surface was alive
and boiling, as it were, with fish. The captain of the steamer, who had
in his lifetime been to all parts of the world, declared that he had
never witnessed such a sight.
A small shark is often caught which is much esteemed by the natives,
and is dried in the sun; also the “pungo,” which attains to as much as
a hundred pounds in weight. It is no unusual sight to see one slung
on a stick passed through the gills and carried on the shoulders of
two blacks, with the tail dragging on the ground. It has very large,
flat scales, and the flesh is not at all coarse in flavour. Latterly,
the Portuguese have salted this fish in barrels, and when I was last
at Loanda I was told of one man who had already salted 2000, and the
season was not then over. It is this fish that is said by the natives
to make the very loud and extraordinary noise that one hears so plainly
at night or early morning, when in a boat or ship; it is said to press
its snout against the vessel and then make the curious sound. I have
heard it so strongly and plainly when lying in a bunk on board steamers
that I have no doubt whatever the fish must have been touching the side
of the vessel, and I have seen the blacks at other times splashing the
water with an oar, because the loud drumming of the pungo kept them
awake when lying in the bottom of a barge. The sound is like a deep
tremolo note on a harmonium, and is quite as loud, but as if played
under water. This low, sustained note has a very strange effect when
first heard so unexpectedly in the still water. It is a migratory
fish, and comes in shoals on the coast only from about June to August.
Another fish like a small cod, called “corvina,” is also migratory,
visiting the coast from July to September, and appears to come from a
northerly direction, as it is a month later in arriving at Mossamedes
than it is at Benguella, a distance of about 160 miles.
Till quite lately the roads and streets of Loanda were of fine, loose,
red sand, rendering walking difficult and uncomfortable, particularly
in the daytime, when the sand becomes burning hot from the sun’s
rays; hence very few people ever walked even short distances, and the
consequence was the constant recourse to the “maxilla” for locomotion.
This is a flat frame of wood and cane-work, with one, or sometimes two
arms at the side, and a low back provided with a cushion. This frame
is hung by cords to hooks on a “bordão,” or palm-pole, about fifteen
or eighteen feet long, and is carried by two blacks (Plate XII.). It
is a very comfortable and lazy contrivance, and the carriers take it
easily at the rate of about three to four miles an hour. The maxilla
is provided with a light painted waterproof cover, and with curtains
to draw all round and effectually hide the inmate, if necessary. The
Portuguese ladies were never seen walking out at any time, and when
going to church, or paying visits, always went in a maxilla closely
curtained that no one might see them. It is difficult to explain the
reason for this, but I believe that a fear of Mrs. Grundy was at the
bottom of it.
There is a very fair military band at Loanda, which plays twice a
week in the high town, and once in a square near the bay. When I was
last at Loanda with my wife, two other English ladies were also there
with their husbands, and as we all listened to the band regularly,
enjoying the cool evening promenade, we, no doubt, at first shocked
the Portuguese greatly by so doing. It had at last, however, the good
effect of bringing many of the Portuguese ladies out also, and they
did not draw the curtains of their maxillas quite so closely as they
used. An officer from Lisbon explained to my wife that the reason his
countrywomen did not like to go about and be seen was that they were
so ugly! But I can emphatically testify that this was an ill-natured
libel on the white ladies of Loanda.
There is a commodious custom-house in the centre of the town. On the
quay are some benches on which the merchants sit in the afternoon to
discuss current events, and to retail the choice bits of scandal of
the day. There are several large and roomy Roman Catholic churches in
the lower town, at which the attendance, however, is not very great,
except at some of the principal festivals. I once saw, in a procession
from one of the churches, in carnival time, a number of little black
girls dressed to represent angels, with white wings affixed to their
backs, and intensely funny they looked. On these occasions, and also
at weddings, christenings, &c., quantities of rockets are sent up in
the daytime, no feast being considered complete without an abundant
discharge of these fire-works, to the immense delight of the black
juvenile population, who yell and scream like demons and throw and roll
themselves about in the sand.
At several places may be seen open barbers’ shops for the natives,
distinguished by a curious sign, namely, two strips of blue cloth edged
with red, about three or four feet long and six inches wide, stretched
diagonally over the entrance (Plate XII.). Inside, a chair covered with
a clean white cotton cloth--with the threads at the ends pulled out for
about four inches, to leave a lace-like design, called “crivo”--invites
customers to enter and sit down, and have their heads shaved quite
bare, the usual custom at Loanda, particularly of the negro women.
The dress of the blacks at Loanda is the same as elsewhere in
Angola;--a cloth round the waist reaching to the knees or ankles
and another thrown over the shoulders, or a cotton shirt, is the
most common. Those who can afford it are fond of dressing in white
man’s costume of coat and trousers, but the grand ambition of all
is to possess an ordinary chimney-pot hat, which is worn on special
occasions, no matter whether the wearer be dressed in cloths or coat.
The costume of the black women of Loanda is hideous. An indigo black
cotton cloth is folded round the body and envelopes it tightly from the
armpits to the feet; another long piece of the same black cloth covers
the head and is crossed over the bosom, or hangs down loosely over the
shoulders, showing only the face and arms.
The correct costume is to have a striped, or other cotton cloth or
print under the black cloths, but as only these latter are seen, the
women have a dreadfully funereal appearance. The poorer class and
slaves wear bright cotton prints, &c., and always a white or red
handkerchief folded narrow and wound round the head very cleverly,
suiting their dark skins remarkably well. A very common ornament round
the forehead is a narrow strip of seed bead-work of different colours
and patterns, and the women are fond of copying the large capital
letters of the advertisements in the Portuguese newspapers, quite
unconscious, of course, of the meaning of their pattern:--I once saw
“Piannos para alugar” (Pianos for hire) worked in beads round the head
of a black woman.
The Loanda women have a singular habit of talking aloud to themselves
as they walk along, which at first strikes a stranger very forcibly;
the men do the same, but to nothing like the extent that the women
do. All loads are carried by the women on their heads, in all parts
of Angola, and the ease with which they balance anything on their
shaven heads is wonderful. It is not difficult to understand that
baskets or heavy loads can be easily balanced, but it is no uncommon
thing to see women and girls walking along with a tea-cup, bottle,
tumbler, or wine glass on their heads, and turning round and talking
without the least fear of its dropping off. The manner in which they
balance the “sangas,” or earthen pots in which they carry water, is the
most curious of all; these are large, and have round, rather pointed
bottoms; a handkerchief is rolled round into a small cushion and put on
the side of the head, and the “sanga” is placed on it, not quite on its
bottom, but a little on one side.
All the natives of Angola, but particularly the women of Loanda, are
very fond of “cola,” the beautiful rose-coloured fleshy fruit of the
_Sterculia cola_. The tree bearing it is very handsome, with small
pretty flowers having a powerful and most disgusting odour. The first
time I became acquainted with the tree was at Bembe. I was out walking,
and suddenly noticed a very bad smell, and on asking a black with me
where it could possibly come from, thinking it was from some dead
animal in a high state of decomposition, he laughed, and pointing to a
tree said it came from the flowers on it;--I plucked a small bouquet
of them, and when I reached home put them in a wine-glass of water to
keep them fresh, and left them on the table of the padre (with whom
I was then staying). When he went into his room he began to call out
for his servants, and asked them why they had allowed cats to get into
his room, and it was some time before he was pacified, or convinced
that the few innocent-looking flowers had made the room stink to that
degree. The flowers are succeeded by large pods, in which are contained
five or more large seeds like peeled chestnuts, closely wedged
together, soft and fleshy, and with a very peculiar, disagreeable,
acrid, bitter flavour. The natives eat a small piece of “cola” with a
bit of green ginger the first thing in the morning, and wash it down
with a dram of gin or other spirit.
Amongst the mulattoes and black women it is usual to send a fresh
“cola” as a present, and there is a symbolical language expressed by
the number of nicks made on it by the nail, of greeting, good wishes,
&c.
A considerable quantity of “cola” was formerly exported to Rio de
Janeiro from Loanda, packed in moist clay or earth to keep it fresh.
Servants in Loanda are almost all slaves. It is very difficult to hire
free men or women. Those seeking service as carriers, porters &c.,
are nearly all slaves to other natives. Slaves as a rule are very
well treated in Angola by the Portuguese, and cases of neglect or
ill-usage are rare. Public opinion is strongly opposed to ill-treatment
of slaves, and there is a certain amount of rivalry in presenting
household slaves, especially well-dressed, and with a healthy
appearance, and even on the plantations inland, or removed from such
influence, I never knew or heard of slaves being worked or treated
in the hard and cruel manner in which they are said to have been in
the Southern States of America, or at the present day in Cuba. It is
easy for slaves in Angola to run away, and it is hardly worth while
to take any steps to recapture them; and if they have any vice or bad
habits, it is so well known that harsh measures will never cure them
of it, that they are sold at once. An ordinary slave is not worth much,
3_l._ to 5_l._ being the utmost value. If proficient in any trade, or
good cooks, then they fetch as much as 20_l._ or more. Many of the
old-established houses make it a point of never selling a slave they
have once bought; and when a slave requires correction or punishment,
he is delivered over to the police for that purpose, and as desired,
he is either placed in the slave-gang, chained by the neck to others,
and made to work at scavengering, carrying stone, &c., or receives a
thrashing with a cat-o’-nine-tails, or a number of strokes on the palms
of the hands with a flat, circular piece of wood pierced with five
holes and with a short handle.
The abolition of slavery in the Portuguese possessions was decreed some
years ago. The names of all the existing slaves had to be inscribed
in the Government office as “Libertos,” and the owners were obliged
to supply them with proper food, clothing, and medicine, and were
not allowed to punish them; while they, on their part, were required
to work for seven years as compensation to their owners, at the
expiration of which time they were to be free. This has been allowed
to remain virtually a dead-letter, the slaves never having had the law
explained to them, and the authorities not troubling themselves to
enforce their liberation at the end of the seven years.
The complete abolition of slavery in Angola has, however, been decreed
to take place in the year 1878; and should the measure be strictly
enforced, the total annihilation and ruin of the thriving and rising
cotton and sugar-cane plantations, &c., will be the result, with a vast
amount of misery to the thousands of liberated blacks.
It is a pity that philanthropy should blindly put so sudden a stop
to a custom that has existed from time immemorial, and of which the
evils are, in a country like Angola, exceedingly slight. The effect of
this measure will be to destroy its nascent industry, the only means
for its progress and development, and will plunge a great part of its
population into helpless misery for years to come. Let slavery be
abolished by all means, but only in the most gradual manner, and in
proportion to the industrial and moral advancement of the race.
The natives of Angola are specially fitted for the introduction of
habits of industry and usages of civilization, as they are naturally
of a peaceable, quiet, and orderly disposition. The difference between
them and the natives of Sierra Leone and the rest of the West Coast is
very striking and pleasing. They have none of the disgusting swagger,
conceit, or cant of the former, but are invariably civil and kindly,
and under a firm and enlightened policy they would become more really
civilized and industrious than any other natives of the West Coast.
That such would be the case is abundantly proved by what has already
been done under the Portuguese in Angola, notwithstanding the
intolerable system of rapine and oppression which the natives have
borne for so many years from their government, a system in which only
quite recently has any improvement been noticed. Were the natives
otherwise than inoffensive and incapable of enmity, they would long ago
have swept away the rotten power of the Portuguese in that large extent
of territory.
Two good paved roads lead from the lower to the upper town of Loanda;
in this are the Governor’s palace, the prison, the treasury and other
public offices, the barracks, and the military and general hospital.
This is the healthiest part of the town, being fully exposed to the
strong sea breeze, and splendid views are obtained from it of the bay,
shipping, and town to the north, and of the coast and the “Ilha” or
island to the south.
The country inland, immediately beyond the town, is dotted with
“mosseques” or country-houses and plantations, and in one depression
or valley are situated the huts comprising the dwelling-places of
the native population, which have lately been removed from the back
of the lower town, where they were a nuisance. In the “Cidade Alta”
there existed till lately the ruins of the former cathedral: these
were cleared away and a tower built on the spot, in which are a few
meteorological instruments, and observations of temperature, height of
barometer, &c., are taken daily. The extensive ruins of a monastery
have also been levelled, and a public garden laid out on their site.
These ruins gave some idea of the importance of Loanda in former and
richer times.
A tame pelican has lived in the “Cidade Alta” for some years. He is fed
daily with a ration of fresh fish from the Governor’s palace, and flies
over every morning to the island to have his bath and plume himself at
the water’s edge, returning regularly after completing his ablutions.
He is very playful, and is fond of giving the nigger children sly pokes
and snaps, or trying to pick the buttons off people’s coats. On the
evenings when the band plays he may be seen promenading about with
becoming gravity as if he enjoyed the music. He is very fond of being
taken notice of, and having his head, and the soft pouch under his long
bill, stroked.
About a mile from the high town, on the road south to Calumbo on the
River Quanza, is an old and deep well called the “mayanga,” where
hundreds of blacks flock daily to draw a limited supply of clear though
slightly brackish water, but the best to be had in Loanda, the usual
wells affording water quite unfit for drinking purposes.
The vegetation about Loanda is scanty, but a milky-juiced, thin-stemmed
euphorbia, called “Cazoneira,” and the cashew-tree, grow very
abundantly on the cliffs, and inland about the “mosseques;”--mandioca,
beans, &c., grow sparingly in the sandy, arid soil.
Oxen thrive, but very little attention is given to rearing them, Loanda
being supplied with cattle from the interior for the beef consumed by
the population.
Angola is one of the penal settlements of Portugal, where capital
punishment was abolished some years ago, and whence the choicest
specimens of ruffians and wholesale assassins are sent to Loanda to
be treated with the greatest consideration by the authorities. On
arriving on the coast, some are enlisted as soldiers, but the more
important murderers generally come provided with money and letters of
recommendation that ensure them their instant liberty, and they start
grog-shops, &c., where they rob and cheat, and in a few years become
rich and independent and even influential personages.
Although most of the convicts are sentenced to hard labour, very few
are made to work at all; but I must do these gentlemen the justice
of saying that their behaviour in Angola is generally very good, and
murders or violence committed by them are extremely rare, though they
may have been guilty of many in Portugal,--the reason of this furnishes
an argument against the abolition of capital punishment; it is because
they have the certainty of being killed if they commit a murder in
Angola, whereas in their mother country they may perpetrate any number
of crimes with the knowledge that if punished at all, it is at most by
simple transportation to a fine country like Angola, where many have
made their fortunes, and where no hardships await them.
In Angola they are thrashed for every crime, and none survive the
punishment if such crime has been of any magnitude. One of the few
cases that I remember at Loanda was that of two convicts who agreed to
kill and rob another who kept a low grog-shop, and who was supposed to
be possessed of a small sum of money. They accomplished their purpose
one night, and returned to the hut where one of them lived, to wash
away the traces of their crime, and hide the money they had stolen. A
little girl, the child of one of the murderers, was in bed in a small
room in the hut at the time, and heard the whole of the proceedings.
Before leaving, the other assassin, suddenly remembering the presence
of the child in the adjoining room, declared that she might have heard
their doings and that it was necessary to kill her also, lest she might
divulge their crime. The monsters approached her little bed for that
purpose, but she feigned sleep so successfully that they spared her
life, thinking she had been fast asleep.
The next day the child informed a woman of what she had heard the night
before, and the inhuman father and his companion were arrested, tried,
and condemned to receive a thousand stripes each. They were thrashed
until it was considered that they had had enough for that day, but
luckily both died on their way to the hospital. At the investigation or
inquest held on their bodies, the doctor certified that their deaths
had been caused by catching cold when in a heated condition on their
way to the hospital from the place of punishment!
In Angola convicts cannot run away, nor would they meet with protection
anywhere, and they would most certainly be killed off quietly for any
crime they might commit, and no one would care to inquire how they came
by their death.
The police of Loanda are all blacks, but officered by Portuguese. They
manage to preserve public order pretty well, and are provided with a
whistle to call assistance, as in Portugal. No slave is allowed to be
about at night after nine o’clock unless provided with a pass or note
from his master.
The lighting of the city is by oil-lamps suspended at the corners of
the streets by an iron framework, so hinged as to allow the lamp to be
lowered when required for cleaning and lighting, and it is secured by a
huge flat padlock.
The military band plays twice a week. There are no places of public
amusement except the theatre, which is a fine one for so small a place
as Loanda, but only amateur representations are given. It was once
closed for a considerable length of time on account of a difference of
opinion amongst the inhabitants as to whether only the few married and
single ladies should be admitted, or whether the many ladies living
under a diversity of arrangements should be on equal terms with the
rest. This very pretty quarrel was highly amusing, and gave rise to
most lively scandal and recrimination between the two contending
parties, but the latter and more numerous and influential section
carried the day, and ever since the doors have been open to all classes
of the fair sex, and the boxes on a gala night may be seen filled with
the swells of the place, accompanied by the many black, mulatto, and
white lady examples of the very elastic state of morals in fashion in
Angola.
There is a well attended billiard-room and café, and lately an hotel
was opened. There is not much society in Loanda, as but few of the
Portuguese bring their wives and families with them, and there are but
few white women.
An official Gazette is published weekly, but it seldom gives any news
beyond appointments, orders, and decrees, movements of shipping, &c.;
a newspaper was attempted, but owing to its violent language it was
suppressed for a time and its editors imprisoned. There are at present
two newspapers, but they indulge abundantly in scurrilous language
and personalities. There is no doubt that a well-conducted newspaper,
exposing temperately the many abuses, and ventilating the questions of
interest in the country, would be of great benefit.