On the 6th of January we reached the village of another female chief, named Nyamoana, who is said to be the mother of Manenko, and sister of Shinte or Kabompo, the greatest Balonda chief in this part of the country.  Her people had but recently come to the present locality, and had erected only twenty huts.  Her husband, Samoana, was clothed in a kilt of green and red baize, and was armed with a spear and a broadsword of antique form, about eighteen inches long and three broad.  The chief and her husband were sitting on skins placed in the middle of a circle thirty paces in diameter, a little raised above the ordinary level of the ground, and having a trench round it.  Outside the trench sat about a hundred persons of all ages and both sexes.  The men were well armed with bows, arrows, spears, and broadswords.  Beside the husband sat a rather aged woman, having a bad outward squint in the left eye.  We put down our arms about forty yards off, and I walked up to the centre of the circular bench, and saluted him in the usual way by clapping the hands together in their fashion.  He pointed to his wife, as much as to say, the honor belongs to her.  I saluted her in the same way, and a mat having been brought, I squatted down in front of them.

The talker was then called, and I was asked who was my spokesman.  Having pointed to Kolimbota, who knew their dialect best, the palaver began in due form.  I explained the real objects I had in view, without any attempt to mystify or appear in any other character than my own, for I have always been satisfied that, even though there were no other considerations, the truthful way of dealing with the uncivilized is unquestionably the best.  Kolimbota repeated to Nyamoana’s talker what I had said to him.  He delivered it all verbatim to her husband, who repeated it again to her.  It was thus all rehearsed four times over, in a tone loud enough to be heard by the whole party of auditors.  The response came back by the same roundabout route, beginning at the lady to her husband, etc.

After explanations and re-explanations, I perceived that our new friends were mixing up my message of peace and friendship with Makololo affairs, and stated that it was not delivered on the authority of any one less than that of their Creator, and that if the Makololo did again break His laws and attack the Balonda, the guilt would rest with the Makololo and not with me.  The palaver then came to a close.

By way of gaining their confidence, I showed them my hair, which is considered a curiosity in all this region.  They said, “Is that hair?  It is the mane of a lion, and not hair at all.”  Some thought that I had made a wig of lion’s mane, as they sometimes do with fibres of the “ife”, and dye it black, and twist it so as to resemble a mass of their own wool.  I could not return the joke by telling them that theirs was not hair, but the wool of sheep, for they have none of these in the country; and even though they had, as Herodotus remarked,