ters and papers which my
good angel at Loanda would be sure to send if they came to hand, but I
afterward found that, though he had offered a large sum to any one who
would return with an assurance of having delivered the last packet he
sent, no one followed me with it to Cabango. The unwearied attentions
of this good Englishman, from his first welcome to me when, a weary,
dejected, and worn-down stranger, I arrived at his residence, and his
whole subsequent conduct, will be held in lively remembrance by me to my
dying day.

Several of the native traders here having visited the country of Luba,
lying far to the north of this, and there being some visitors also from
the town of Mai, which is situated far down the Kasai, I picked up some
information respecting those distant parts. In going to the town of Mai
the traders crossed only two large rivers, the Loajima and Chihombo. The
Kasai flows a little to the east of the town of Mai, and near it there
is a large waterfall. They describe the Kasai as being there of very
great size, and that it thence bends round to the west. On asking an
old man, who was about to return to his chief Mai, to imagine himself
standing at his home, and point to the confluence of the Quango and
Kasai, he immediately turned, and, pointing to the westward, said, "When
we travel five days (thirty-five or forty miles) in that direction, we
come to it." He stated also that the Kasai received another river, named
the Lubilash. There is but one opinion among the Balonda respecting the
Kasai and Quango. They invariably describe the Kasai as receiving
the Quango, and, beyond the confluence, assuming the name of Zaire or
Zerezere. And the Kasai, even previous to the junction, is much larger
than the Quango, from the numerous branches it receives. Besides those
we have already crossed, there is the Chihombo at Cabango; and forty-two
miles beyond this, eastward, runs the Kasai itself; fourteen miles
beyond that, the Kaunguesi; then, forty-two miles farther east, flows
the Lolua; besides numbers of little streams, all of which contribute to
swell the Kasai.

About thirty-four miles east of the Lolua, or a hundred and thirty-two
miles E.N.E. of Cabango, stands the town of Matiamvo, the paramount
chief of all the Balonda. The town of Mai is pointed out as to the
N.N.W. of Cabango, and thirty-two days or two hundred and twenty-four
miles distant, or about lat. S. 5d 45'. The chief town of Luba, another
indepen