The Ancient African
kingdom of i^ongo-*£-*£
Something the History of This Interesting Tep
ritory for Centuries a Portuguese Colony.
U-- • J
EATS WITH HIS KNIFE.
Heroic Mensnres Adopted by Vonii|
Woman to Break Her Sweet
heart's ltad Habit,
An injured heart toils this tale of
woe in a letter to the Philadelphia
North American:
“A young gentleman has been asked
t.o dine at the house of the parents of
the iady whom he fully intends to mar
ry if she will have him. Should the
man feel encouraged or not, provided
he was given a knife sharp as a rnzty,
and in unguarded moments forgot his
proper table manners and lapsed into
the old habit of eating with his knife?
He out his tongue, also his lips, each
time he forgot his manners by using
the knife. All this in view of the fact
that the young lady was aware of his
occasional lapse into feeding with the
knife.’she having dined before in res
taurants with him. The other knives,
even the carver, were not nearly as
keen-edged. In fact, the other knives
at the table were very dull. The one
the man had could not have been
keener if it had been sharpened to
shave with.”
“You see the loving young man
branching at the steel, the sweetheart
cruel only to be kind, papa and mamma
looking on in amazement. Embar
rassed by their presence, dazzled by
his charmer, fascinated by the perilous
edge, the youth wounds himself again
and again, although he read a treatise
on table etiquette not five minutes be
fore be took fare for the house of his
beloved. There can be no doubt of
uri 11 i> nriii iiuvi/
the carver is dull or papa wouldn’t saw
the roast so. All the other knives look
innocent and incapable of hurting a
pie. much less a man. The young man’s
weapon is a trenchant blade, a rapier,
a ‘razzer.’ Xo wonder he is sore. Xo
wonder he goes away in sadness and
perplexity. Is she whom lie thought
all sweetness no better than a savage?
Knowing this weakness., should she
not have spared him?”
The instruction was pitiless, but it
seems to have been needed. It is for
the young man to be purified through
suffering. The young woman must be
a forgiving young woman or she would
have bidden him nevermore be follow
er of hers after he had knifed himself
in the paternal and maternal presence.
There she was justly sharp with him.
If nothing but bloodshed will cure him
of the odious habit, let blood flow! It
is for the fellow’s own good. I f lie can
be reformed, if he can be reclaimed
from the ranks of the knife-eaters, se
verity must do it. Xo doubt kindness
has been tried at the restaurants, and
has been found unavailing. What will
teach this intractable booby the prop
er use of the knife? In the words of
Mrs. Mica wber’s papa, experience
does it.
A strange picture, this carnage in
Philadelphia, the relentless lady, the
bleeding swain angry with the hand
that guides him. The bleeding swain
ought to: feel encouraged. Had he
rather jab himself with a knife than
win a lady who has undertaken to edu
cate him?
PayinK the Premium.
Some few months ago a young
matron telephoned to one of the young
men she knew, who is connected with
a large insurance firm, asking him to
write a policy covering her new house
hold effects.
“Don’t tell Dick,” she asked. “I
want to surprise fyim. He really thinks
I have no business head at all.”
The young man assented and issued
the policy. He waited a considerable
time for the payment of the premium.
His friendship for the young woman
caused him to resist sending the bill,
but he finally did so. The recipient
complained bitterly to an acquaint
ance. who is considerable of a wag, and
he readily encouraged her in her ideas.
“Now, really,” she said, wrinkling
her pretty brows, “this bit of paper
costs next to nothing. I could have
written it myself.”
“Yes,” said lie, “but if you have a
fire the company will have to pay the
loss.”
“Well.” she suggested, “let them de
deduct what they say I owe them.
Then they won’t be out anything.”—
Ch icago Record -He ra 1 d.
Photographing* the Oval Sun.
The fact that the sun when poised on
the horizon sometimes appears great
ly distorted, or drawn out into the
form of an oval, is well known, and the
explanation is very simple, namely,
the rapid change in the refractive in
dex of the air near the horizon, in con
sequence of which tlie lower edge of
the sun appears to be lifted with refer
ence to the upper edge, and so the disk
looks as if squeezed between top and
bottom. Recently Prof. Prinz, of the
Brussels observatory, has obtained
several large scale photographs of the
setting sun which distinctly show the
deformation of the disk, and render its
measurement very easy. Jn one ease
the vertical diameter is to the horizon
tal in the ratio of 75 to 81. Sometimes
the distortion is greater than that.—
Science.
Women Bgronet*.
In only two cases have baronetcies
been conferred on women in England.
Once was in 1886 on the mother of Gen.
Cornelius Speelman. The other was
Dame Maria Bolles, made so by
Charles 1.—.N. Y. Suu.
Henry Owen
PHYSICIAN, SURGEON ANft
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10 PORTUGUESE unprogres
siveness may be attributed
the lack of development in '
one of the most fertile of
the West African terri
tories. Angola, the ancient
seat of the Kongo empire, whose his
tory stretches back through many cen
turies, has been under the dominion of
Portugal since the daj's when that lit
tle kingdom was considered one of the
ruling powers of the sea, and when its
ships sailed all the known and discov
ered many of the unknown waters of
the world. Portugal still rules in An
but its rule is that of the dying;
^|^it instills no hope, no ambition into the
black natives, and its authority carries
with it no progress for that great
stretch of territory over which its flag
floats.
It is a remarkable fact that the
northern portion of the province of
Angola is the least known of all the
districts in this part of Africa, not
withstanding its proximity to the sea
r ■ - - --------
a church be erected on the spot, to be
called the Church of the Holy Cross. In
all 11 churches are spoken of as having
been built here, but it is almost cer
tain that they did not'coexist. Old
buildings were destroyed and rebuilt;
these were rededicated 1*o some other
saint according to the tastes of the
priests there at the time, and hence
the confusion. We are assured, for ex
ample, that one night the devil came
and carried away fhe roof of the
church of Santa Cruz, and the Yakkas
from the Kwangu, who seem to have
been in league with his majesty of the
lower regions, followed hard after, and
completed the destruction of both
church and city.
When the Kongos, after a short pe
riod, reoccupied their capital with the
help of Portuguese traders and priests,
they directed their attention to the
fortification of the city and surround
ed it with massive stone walls. They
also constructed inner wralls around
the king’s palace and the dwellings of
RUIN8 OF AN ANCIENT CHURCH AT SAN SALVADOR.
coast, and its being the first discovered
by the early Portuguese travelers, and
the country covered by the ancient
kingdom of Kongo. We owe the very
name of “C-ongo” to this old kingdom,
We first became acquainted with this
marvelous country in the story of the
voyages of Diogo Cam, who, on reach
ing the mouth of the river in the year
1482, learnt from the natives who
boarded his vessel that “far in the in
terior there lived a powerful king.”
He thereupon dispatched to this king
“some Christian negroes as his ambas
sadors,” to assure him of the friendly
intentions of his visitors from Portu
gal, and of their desire to trade. Thus
was effected the first discovery of a
wonderful people and a powerful Afri
can monarch.
Battel 1, Duarte Lopez, Cavazzi and
others have left us truly wonderful de
scriptions of the kingdoms of Kongo
and Angola as they were, or supposed
to be, in the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries. And, making due allowance
for a vivid imagination in matters of
detail, we nre compelled to recognize
the royal ser\*ice which these early
travelers rendered to the cause of
what may be termed unscientific
geography.” In those palmy days of
the Spanish and Portuguese nations,
there is no doubt but that a certain
amount of civilization was introduced
into the country. The whites who
were sent out from Portugal estab
lished themselves at several points tm
. . i e i 1 _!__ n'vtVi
tne soum l>uuk ui ****.*,««- -
commendable skill and perseverance
built houses, fortresses and churches,
K the ruins of which are still to be seen
at Sonyo near the mouth, at Mbembe
in the interior behind Ambrizette, and
notably at San Salvador, the capital of
the ancient kingdom. This last is be
yond doubt the most important, and is
full of historical interest. We read of
a mighty monarch who ruled over a
vast region, with a host of princes gov
erning dependent provinces. The
pomp and glory of this brilliant court
are startling in the extreme, and one
gasps for breath at reading of the
rapidity with which the king and
nobles of a hitherto heathen and pa
gan country put on the garb of our
European civilization and espoused the
Christian religion. For in the year
1491 many priests arrived from Eu
rope, and very soon three churches
•were built—one dedicated to the Sa
viour, whence the city derived the
name of San Salvador; the second and
third were dedicated to the A irgin
Mary and St. James, in recognition of
their miraculous intervention on be
half of the people at a critical point in
one of their battles. These were not,
however, the first, for a church was
erected when the first Christian king,
Don Joao, made a vow of fidelity to
God, and planted a large wooden cross
in an open space in the town as a wit
«««s; afterwards be commanded that
the nobles; also one surrounding the
European quarters. Pigafetta speaks
of these walls, and his description of
them is one the few things that can
be relied on in liis highly embellished
book of romances.
The massive walls and churches were
built of the ironstone so plentiful on
the plateau on which San Salvador is
situated. Some huge blocks of this
stone were used in the foundations and
for the doorways and arches of the
churches. The walls had thin layers
of limestones used as “headers” to
bind them together. Very excellent
mortar was made, and an abundant
supply of limestone was obtained from
the quarries a few miles away. The
amount of labor represented by these
ruins must have been enormous, but
we must remember that the work was
done in “the golden days of slavery,”
and Kongo at that time was the great
center of the trade. The population
of the capital then is given at 100,000;
to-day it does not exceed 1,500.
It is impossible, with materials at
our command, to say how long this city
was occupied by the Portuguese.
When the “trade” was firmly estab
lished, and the kings and nobles of
Kongo became the active agents of the
white traders and faithful;vassals of
the king of Portugal, the European
residents could withdraw to the coast
at Loamda and Ambrizette, pmying
yearly visits during the dry seasons to
San Salvador to conduct to the coast
_._1 „ ± ^ ~ ^
V.V. ... V.- — ■ v“‘
Sometimes, however, the gangs were
intrusted to the care of a reliable na
tive. I knew well two old men who
went repeatedly for this purpose to
Loanda. They counted on three
months for the return journey, and
many gruesome tales they had to re
late. They thought that they were in
the service of Nemputu, the king of
Portugal! The companies of slaves
were generally accompanied by one or
more priests, who received slaves from
the natives in return for baptizing
their children and administering spir
itual consolation to the nobles of the
land. These gangs of chained slaves,
moving ponderously along on their
way to the coast, have left behind them
indelible marks; and their tracks are
easily recognized by the names of
towns and villages where they halted
or encamped for the night
Such is the past record of a kingdom
which has now been induced to all but
an empty name, for the present king
of Kongo is nothing more than an ordi
nary native chief, with very limited
powers, even over his own people.
Nevertheless, he is endowed with a re
markable amount of self-importance
and conceit, imagining himself of more
consequence than the tsar of all the
Kussias, and having an equal only in
the king of Portugal.
REV. THOMaS LEWIS.
English African Misslona*-*
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