Page:On the Central South African Tribes from the South Coast to the Zambesi.pdf/2

 the English and Dutch dealt with them. Then I endeavoured to ascertain if there was any connection between those tribes and others further inland. When I visited the interior I entered the villages professionally, and in this way I was successful in gaining the confidence of the natives. I am proud to say that I was thus enabled to observe what many other travellers could not, namely, how the natives appeared in their private lives; in fact, I could see, as it were, behind the curtain. The result was that, certainly against my own will, I have had to upset certain opinions which have been formed about the natives.

I divide my subject into two sections: the first concerns the tribes of whom I found traces, but who are not now in existence; and the second section relates to living tribes. The non-existing tribes I again divide into two branches.

Along the south coast I found traces of tribes which do not now exist there, such as heaps of burnt bones of wild animals, none of domestic animals, and broken shells. These heaps are often 6 feet high, having a circumference of from 40 to 60 feet. When able to dig up some of their implements, we shall, I suppose, find some relationship between those past tribes and the one which still up to the present time exists (living upon fish and mussels) in the rocks and caves of the Portuguese settlement on the west coast of Africa. I conclude, therefore, that those heaps were formed by a race which stood very low indeed, but in order to obtain complete information on the subject, it would be necessary to spend three or four months in investigation and in digging the mounds; I could not then spare the time, but I hope to be able to do so during my next journey.

The second group of non-existing tribes belonged to the regions between the Limpopo and the Zambesi. I found there ruins of locations. It is very well known that two hundred years ago there was an empire in Central Africa, with which the Dutch and Portuguese traders were well acquainted. We also know that there were provinces called Motapa or Monopotapa, but that is all the information we have about them. I am not sure that the ruins I saw belonged to this extinct race, but I believe so; they were generally in the vicinity of mines, especially gold mines.