in.[FN#3]


The Wanguana or Freed Men

The Wa-n-guana, as their name implies, are men freed from
slavery; and as it is to these singular negroes acting as hired
servants that I have been chiefly indebted for opening this large
section of Africa, a few general remarks on their character
cannot be out of place here.

Of course, having been born in Africa, and associated in
childhood with the untainted negroes, they retain all the
superstitious notions of the true aborigines, though somewhat
modified, and even corrupted, by that acquaintance with the outer
world which sharpens their wits.

Most of these men were doubtless caught in wars, as may be seen
every day in Africa, made slaves of, and sold to the Arabs for a
few yards of common cloth, brass wire, or beads. They would then
be taken to the Zanzibar market, resold like horses to the
highest bidder, and then kept in bondage by their new masters,
more like children of his family than anything else. In this new
position they were circumcised to make Mussulmans of them, that
their hands might be "clean" to slaughter their master's cattle,
and extend his creed; for the Arabs believe the day must come
when the tenets of Mohammed will be accepted by all men.

The slave in this new position finds himself much better off than
he ever was in his life before, with this exception, that as a