CHAPTER I.

EARLIER ATTEMPTS TO CHRISTIANISE CENTRAL AFRICA.

The Ancients were not so ignorant about Africa as is often supposed. Ever since that old Phenician fleet went down the Red Sea and appeared, three years afterwards, in the Mediterranean, people knew that it was possible to sail round the Continent. It is said that the great Portuguese explorers derived an impulse from old maps which described Southern Africa as bounded by sea, but in any case the Portuguese are justly celebrated for their African discoveries, for all the knowledge on this subject that came from antiquity was in their days as faint as a half-forgotten dream.

No sooner had the Portuguese discovered places like the “Empire of Monomotopa” than they wanted to open them up. They sent their colonies and their armies; and the Church of Rome soon had missionaries among the native tribes.

At Sofala the new settlers asked permission to build a ‘warehouse,’ but built really a fortification. The native king becoming aware of this, tried to surprise and massacre them, but he failed, and they eventually became masters of the country.

Joano Dos Santos tells us in his history of Eastern Ethiopia how he left Portugal for Eastern Africa in 1586. His book contains several notes on the inhabitants. He questioned them about their belief in God, and inclines to think that at some period in the past they had been acquainted with ‘true religion’. He mentions in confirmation of this that they kept certain festivals with a strictness that might put Christians to shame. He found that they used ‘disagreeable herbs’ for an ordeal, and thinks it is possible that the Deity may interpose for the punishment of the guilty and the acquittal of the innocent. He expresses the view that the ordeal is founded on the Bible. The natives were fond of showing him their hunting powers and presenting him with what they caught.

In his book, which is more a history of the country than of mission work, he takes note of the barbarous customs of the people; he speaks of their beer-drinkings, which on special occasions would last for a week, during which no one knew his companion. He mentions a tribe near Tete where men, women, and children were kept in pens, and killed and eaten in succession by their barbarous imprisoners. Sometimes the natives would overpower the settlements of the Portuguese, who were then treated in the most horrifying manner.

The monks that were in the country served more as chaplains to the Portuguese armies than as missionaries to the heathen. The Portuguese were endeavouring to introduce some kind of order among the native tribes, and to develop the resources of the country especially in gold and silver mines. Hence the Portuguese soldiers appeared in this quarter following the crucifix and the arms of Portugal. A successful chief on the other side would don the ‘clerical dress’ of some monk that he had slain, and appear at the head of his clan with the chalice in one hand and a spear in the other. But in course of time the country became more settled, and the missionaries had numerous stations.

On the west coast the Portuguese missionaries seem to have laboured with great zeal. Father Carli (1666) has recorded his experiences of African life both in health and sickness, and many of his statements give a good idea of inconveniences to be met with in Africa even at the present day. He says, “My bed was against a wall which might well be called a nest of rats—they were so many and so large that they troubled me very much, running over me and biting my toes, which kept me from sleep. I caused my bed to be put in the middle of the room, but to no purpose, for those cursed creatures knew where to find me. I caused mats to be laid all about my bed for my blacks to lie on and defend me, not only against the rats, but any other wild creatures that might come. This precaution stood me in no stead, for there was no night but the rats disturbed me.” In his distress he applied to the Great Duke. “I took the freedom,” he says, “to acquaint the Great Duke with the trouble I had from the rats, and the stink of my blacks who had always some wild and disagreeable smell.” The Duke promised him an infallible cure, and sent him forthwith a tame monkey which lay at the foot of his bed. When the rats appeared the little monkey blew hard at them, two or three times, which made them run away, and its scent of musk corrected ‘the ill smell’ of the blacks. “The little monkey,” he adds, “kept my head and beard clean and combed, better than any of the blacks would have done; and to say the truth, it is easier to teach those monkeys than the blacks.”

There is perhaps a note of bitterness and disappointment in the last remark, but those that can understand the poor writer’s condition at the time will readily forgive it. For many weeks he had been watching by the death-bed of his companion, and afterwards was prostrated by extreme sickness himself. He had no one with him but the blacks, “who stole what they could and brought him when they thought of it, a porringer of broth”. One night his bed was attacked by a swarm of ants, and he had to be carried outside. Alarms of fire annoyed the poor invalid in the same way. Yet he was not forgetful of his commission from the Church in the way that he understood it. “Every day,” he says, “I baptised ten or twelve children; and not being able to sit up alone in my bed, was held up by two blacks, another holding the book, and another the basin.” The instruction given at baptism was by no means elaborate, even when the sacrament was administered to adults. Though but a short time in the country he had baptised an almost incredible number of natives. He says, as he looks back on the ‘great fatigues’ of his travels, that he would think his days well spent “if but one of 2700 children and youths he baptized obtained salvation through his ministry”. The good man, I have no doubt, had some misgivings as to whether the mere rite of baptism had permanently benefitted all that had received it. His stay in the country though brief would be long enough to raise doubts in his mind on that point. He does not speak hopefully of all the baptized. If he had been able to stay with them and teach them directly in their own tongue, this criticism would be much modified. Still the efforts of these missionaries would not be lost. They tried to do God’s work, and no one can have a higher motive. If there be anything in their methods that we now think inexpedient, let us learn the proper lesson, and let us remember the courage and zeal they manifested amidst their trials. Moreover, he does speak of a school where natives were taught the Portuguese language and received instruction in religion. Some of them, “though blacks,” showed considerable genius. The people, he tells us, did not trouble about laying up great stores of provisions; they scarce cared in the morning whether they should have anything at night. When they accompanied the Father on any of his journeys, sometimes he had nothing to give them because he had nothing for himself. Then they would take a piece of wood for a mattock and cut up the ground, and eat certain little white balls they found near the roots of the grass. He says, “I could not for the life of me swallow one of them, yet after such a wretched meal they would skip, dance, and laugh as if they had been at a feast”.

Merolla (1682) is one of the earliest to give a detailed account of mission work in Central Africa. He and his companions found themselves greatly opposed by wizards, who were often seized and sent to the Portuguese Governor who condemned them to death. As the native law itself possessed similar provisions, the people supported the missionaries in this measure and assisted in bringing wizards to justice. One of the laws introduced was that after a person was absolved by the missionary, he was freed from the consequences of any civil crime. “If God has pardoned, how can man pretend to find guilty?” They had established the Confessional, and many of them, like Luther, would try to make it a means of correcting the faults and informing the minds of their people.

They also had their troubles with slavery. A Cardinal wrote them ‘in the name of the sacred college complaining that the pernicious and abominable abuse of selling slaves was still continued among them, and asked them to use their power to remedy the said abuse’. They had little hope of checking the evil, because there was no trade in the country except ‘in slaves and ivory’; but they met together and petitioned the authorities ‘that heretics at least should be excluded from this merchandise more especially the English who made it their chief business to buy slaves here,’ and whose slaves were in danger of having the good principles instilled into them perverted by contact with Protestants! The authorities granted their petition, but opposed its operation. This brought the missionaries into serious collision with their governors, whom, however, they promptly excommunicated. When the struggle was over, the Governors wished to be restored to the church, and the penance prescribed for them is instructive, as showing how the Missionaries studied, and tried to remodel, the whole social life of their people. ‘The penance I imposed upon the Count was that he by his authority should oblige 300 of those that lived in unlawful wedlock to marry.’ The restored Count did even more, he ‘brought over 400 to the holy state of matrimony’. On the whole the Missionaries seem to have introduced greater purity into those regions. They could also do much to prevent wars and bloodshed. They had great influence with native rulers. Occasionally kings and their subjects came expressing a desire to be received into the Church in a body, but, alas, their motives were not above suspicion—before submitting to baptism, these converts insisted on making stipulations about ‘trade and commerce’; these stipulations the Missionaries assented to and tried to fulfil. On occasions of baptism, it was usual to bring presents to the Mission, and nothing can better show the discouragements that surrounded these men than the fact that on such occasions they were often presented with poisoned food. Merolla mentions seven Missionaries that were thus poisoned, and he himself had a narrow escape. They carried silver chalices, censers, &c., which were, in some instances, an inducement to take away their lives. They set themselves vigorously to oppose all ‘idolatry’—under which head they classed the native charms. They were not without apprehension of the power of sorcerers. Merolla mentions that an old witch lay down on the ground beside him, and began to scrape a hole in it. ‘At the sight of this,’ he says, ‘I immediately ordered my interpreter to begone, being more concerned for him than myself, for as a priest that had always trusted in God, I doubted not but to render her charms ineffectual as to myself.’ But he does not seem to have been quite at ease, and tried afterwards to avoid her. He explains that when they dig a hole thus in the ground they have the intention of bewitching a person to death. In estimating the native character, he says, ‘The Negroes are both a malicious and a subtle people, and I likewise must allow that they spend the most of their time in circumventing and deceiving, yet I cannot allow that because they are a stubborn soil they must be left uncultivated’. To say that they are always obstinate and perverse, and man-eaters is not to be made an objection against them, because our Saviour says, ‘Those that are well do not stand in need of a physician’. He contends that they really embrace Christianity.

The above quoted Missionaries, it will be perceived, all belonged to the Church of Rome, which was earliest at work in this quarter of Africa. Their experiences are valuable to this day, as showing the nature of the difficulties to be met, and suggesting also that Missionaries should study more and more closely the ideal of Mission Life contained in the Acts of the Apostles. While admitting that these men spent much of their time in instructing their converts, I still think that their work in the district of the Zambeze would have been more permanent if they had set themselves to teach these natives to read and to form an intelligent judgment on the message that was brought them. But printing presses were not easily procured in those days, and the Missionaries did ‘what they could’.

Before the time of Livingstone, the people of England knew little or nothing of Central Africa. But the Portuguese were fairly familiar with it. They had explorers as well as missionaries. Foremost among their explorers was Dr. Lacerda, who set out from the neighbourhood of Tete in July, 1798, and encountered quite his own share of the difficulties of African travel. His carriers left him in scores, and he was tortured by the fear that they would all desert “in a body”. He had little confidence in the tribes that he was to pass through; and his heart sank within him on finding that the natives with him hardly knew how to use their muskets. After a march of about three months, he died at Kazembe’s. Father Pinto kept a diary of the return journey, from which it appears that the party suffered much from sickness and enemies. They had to fight their way through the Awisa, and even after they were out of Awisa territory, every little chief contrived either to rob them or make them give up their goods as ‘presents’. They were so dispirited that the least threat made them yield. Tete was so far civilised by this time, that Pinto had a repugnance to appear on daylight except in ‘decent clerical attire’. In 1806, Baptista performed the journey across Africa between Angola and Tete, and soon after, a decree was issued from the Palace of Rio de Janeiro ordering the formation of a company of pedestrians to be employed in the communication between the East coast and the West.