Nkokolani, January 12, 1895
Your Excellency Counselor José d’Almeida
I write to Your Excellency in order to apprise you of my arrival at Nkokolani, which occurred midmorning yesterday, in the company of the adjunct, Mariano Fragata. The news I send you is not the best, and I beg forgiveness in advance for the following report, which surely does not correspond with what Your Excellency was hoping to hear. Contrary to what we hoped, the grocer, Francelino Sardinha, was not awaiting us on our arrival. The young girl I mentioned in my last letter proved very useful. She is well educated and speaks our language beautifully. It was she who welcomed us. Her name is Imani, and she will prove extremely helpful to me in my mission.
I should mention that I have been considerably impressed by the cleanliness and dimensions of the settlement, which bear no comparison with those of other, similar villages in the neighboring territories of the Bitongas and VaTsongas. I asked the girl whether she was proud of the size and orderliness of her village. And she gave me a strange reply: Everyone there felt this pride except for her. For her, there was only one reason for its growth—fear. Nkokolani had grown in proportion to the extent that its inhabitants had shrunk. This was what Imani said, using these same sophisticated words. Then she added that its folk had gathered together there under the illusion that they were safer in numbers. But it is our terror that rules over us, she said, pointing to the leafy orange trees bordering the streets. These trees are sacred for the Chopi. The kaffirs believe that orange trees defend them from spells and curses, their worst enemies. Who knows, maybe I shall plant a tree in my backyard? If it does not give me protection, it will always afford me shade and fruit.
In contrast to the rest of the village, the military post where I shall be stationed is an example of total and absolute decline. To describe the decrepit building as a “barracks” can only stem from some huge distortion that fails to distinguish between fact and desire. It would be best if that hovel were demolished, for it is an unacceptable cross between an armory and a store for selling junk.
Your Excellency knows the history of that dilapidated building. The Portuguese dug the foundations and erected the walls more than two decades ago. The intention really was to build a garrison, but they did not get as far as making a roof, windows, or doors. The garrison remained an aspiration, but it began to crumble, abandoned and forgotten. Years later, an audacious trader by the name of Francelino Sardinha completed the building and set up his shop there. At the moment, the construction gives the impression of some hybrid creature: half fort, half store.
Now, even as I write, sitting at a table in the ill-fated store, hairy spiders crawl across my hands and over my papers. The loathsome creatures, along with a variety of nameless insects, are attracted by the light of the lamps. The alternative would be darkness, an unhappy anticipation of death. And Your Excellency knows how night falls early in this part of the world.
Last night, I crushed one of these disgusting spiders with a paperweight. A thick, foul-smelling squirt of liquid flooded the tabletop, rendering the correspondence lying there useless. My face, hands, and arms were splashed with the greenish venom. I was scared the poison might be absorbed by my skin and spread throughout my body. Imani tells me I should not kill animals. And she has a curious theory about the uses of spiders. She says their webs close the scars of the world, and they heal wounds that I don’t know exist within me. In short, superstitions unique to these ignorant folk.
It is not just the dilapidated state of the military quarters that is a matter of concern to me. I must confess, counselor, my surprise upon seeing such extensive areas of land devoid of buildings and of Europeans. In my naïveté, I had a very different picture of the colony of Mozambique. I was under the impression we actually ruled over our territories. In fact, our presence has been limited for centuries to the estuaries of certain rivers, and to the provisioning of fresh water to ships. The sad reality: the only inhabitants of this vast hinterland are kaffirs and Indian traders. The rare signs of our presence are adulterated, thanks to people like the storekeeper and his ilk.
The courier charged with conveying this missive is called Mwanatu and is Imani’s brother. The boy seems somewhat stupid, but, to be perfectly honest, I prefer this to someone shifty who might not be trusted. Taking advantage of Mwanatu’s role as Sardinha’s errand boy, I have given the simpleton tasks befitting an auxiliary soldier. For example, I have given him an obsolete rifle that no longer fires shots, and he has proudly assumed the duty of guarding the building.
I have not yet checked the arsenal that was left to the grocer to guard, and which I do not think was very large in terms of quantity. The task will require time and effort, because, at the moment, everything is mixed up: merchandise along with munitions. As soon as I have carried out a survey of the store, I shall send you a detailed report on the ordnance held here.
I should, in truth, say that huge and exaggerated expectations have begun to develop in Nkokolani regarding the arrival of Mouzinho de Albuquerque. Not that anyone knows him, and, to be perfectly honest, the Negroes can barely pronounce our cavalry captain’s name. But their boundless fear is the reason they persist in fabricating some messiah who will save them. It is, of course, true that, after our recent military victories, many local southern rulers have turned their backs on Gungunhane and have sworn allegiance to us. Though our recent increase in influence may well have brought hope to the natives, the change in their loyalty may prove fatal to them. If we do not confirm the effectiveness of our power, these rulers will vacillate and, fearing terrible punishment, will become subjects of the great king of Gaza once again.
This is one of the reasons why these people place so much hope in the arrival of Mouzinho and his cavalry. There are, in fact, other reasons feeding into their attachment to the figure of Mouzinho.
The first is that many people in Nkokolani are tired of conversations. And they are perplexed at our insistence in negotiating with someone who is untrustworthy, rather than in waging war against the common enemy.
There is, however, another reason why they have invested in the construction of an imaginary savior. This has nothing to do with Mouzinho. It has, Your Excellency will be surprised to hear, to do with horses. According to the kaffirs, horses are not earthbound creatures. The kaffirs know this from the way their hooves tread the ground: with a nervous, restless step like that of long-legged birds. They don’t walk or run like zebras or wildebeests, the nearest animals to horses that they know, creatures that tread the untamed ground with familiarity. Horses have a different gait, and they scarcely make contact with the ground. They advance across the veld as if they were clouds crossing the sky. Hence the belief: horses, they insist, were brought from that distant place where the earth’s frontier touches the firmament. The kaffirs must certainly have seen images of Saint George and other saints descending from the skies on horseback, on the postcards distributed around here by the former priest.
Whatever we may think, this is how the kaffirs see it; this is their perception of an animal they have never seen before. If for us horses are a weapon of war, for these people they provoke other battles, equally serious and mortal. Inhambane is gripped by a war of witchcraft, potions, and curses. There isn’t a witch doctor around here who is not busy blessing the arrival of our cavalry. When I mentioned here in Nkokolani that some of the horses—such as the one belonging to Ayres de Ornelas—had died of tremors and fevers, there were those who immediately attributed the illness to the VaNguni spirits. Similar blame was invented when they discovered that where there were assumed to be extensive green pastures all the grassland had suddenly become dry and barren. Such a sudden, inexplicable change could only be the work of villainous sorcerers.
Do not therefore believe, dear counselor, that they have any particular fellow feeling for those for whom Your Excellency harbors no affection. For all these reasons, I must encourage you not to ponder too much what the military may be planning. Continue your enterprising efforts in carrying out negotiations with the blacks.
Some say that our policy of dialogue betrays our fear and lack of preparation. These malicious tongues are ignorant of the State of Gaza’s capacity for waging war. There are tens of thousands of fearless warriors, fully prepared and ideally equipped for a war out in the bush. I see open confrontation with Mudungazi’s forces as no more than a reckless adventure destined to failure.
What we think is arrogance among the Negroes is merely an awareness of their numerical and military superiority. In fact, their insolence did not begin with Gungunhane. Over fifty years ago, the king of the Zulus, Dingane, treated us as his subordinates. He believed he had the power to dismiss and appoint European chiefs to govern territories that were ours by right but which he seemed to think belonged exclusively to him. The whole of the south of Mozambique, in his twisted understanding, was a Zulu colony temporarily ceded to the whites to administer.
This was how, in 1833, Dingane decided to replace the governor, Dionísio António Ribeiro, based in Lourenço Marques. He appointed in his place Anselmo Nascimento, a well-known trader who provided goods and services to the neighboring territories. The Zulu king was exchanging one white for another. Dingane argued that the Portuguese controlled each other better. The execution of this measure was, however, suspended. By the end of 1833, the Zulu ruler had decided to keep Governor Ribeiro in power, even though the latter paid him no tribute.
Then, during the course of one of their raids to capture slaves, the Portuguese killed some Zulus by mistake. That was when the rupture occurred. Since Dionísio Ribeiro refused to be dismissed by someone who had not appointed him, King Dingane invaded the city, obliging the governor to seek refuge on the island of Xefina.
As Ribeiro was trying to escape in a small boat, he was caught and killed. They executed him publicly by breaking his neck. What did the Portuguese authorities do in response to this outrage? They ignored it. His successor as governor presented apologies in advance to Dingane, arguing that the colony was poor and that Lisbon’s empty coffers rendered him unable to pay taxes to the Zulu emperor.
Cowardly postures such as these merely lend legitimacy to the imperialist pretensions of the English, proving to them that Portugal does not possess the capabilities to govern her African colonies. I do not know whether I feel greater hatred of English ambitions or our own authorities’ shameful submission.