Page:George McCall Theal, History of Africa south of the Zambesi from 1505 to 1795, Volume 3 (3rd ed, 1922).djvu/35

1728] could not prevent them from trafficking with the inhabitants if they were resolved to do so.

After this for some time the two parties were outwardly on friendly terms, but no attempt was made to examine the country around. There was very little sickness, and no other difficulty was apparent in the way of exploration, but the Dutch officers thought it best to keep their people together and to confine themselves to an effort to see what trade could be done. They had obtained forty-two slaves, three hundred and five kilogrammes of ivory, one hundred and fifty grammes of ambergris, and twenty-three kilogrammes of wax, when one day they found that none of the inhabitants would come near them. The reason was that a Portuguese officer with a large band of armed blacks had arrived from Sofala, and was executing dire vengeance upon all who had been dealing with them. To have remained longer would have been useless under the circumstances, so they returned at once to Delagoa Bay. After that time the Dutch East India Company never thought of forming a settlement at Inhambane, but it was still kept in contemplation to establish a station on some other part of the coast, if a suitable place could be found.

The misery of life at Fort Lydzaamheid was so great that in 1728 a large number of men conspired to seize the Company's magazine in order to provide themselves with goods, to put to death all who should resist them, and then to march overland to the Portuguese factories in the north, from which they hoped to be able to make their way to some other part of the world. The plot was to have been carried out in the night of the 19th of August, but during the preceding day a sailor boy made the acting commander Van de Capelle acquainted with it. The necessary steps were at once taken to secure the conspirators, and in the course of a few hours sixty-two men—one third of the garrison, which was then one hundred and eighty-six strong—were arrested and placed in close confinement.