hundred dollars; a wild "nigger" near the river costs from thirty
to thirty-five dollars; the same may be bought in the Apinji
country for four dollars' worth of assorted goods, the "bundle-
trade" as it is called; but there is the imminent risk of the
chattel's running away. A man's only attendants being now his
wives and serviles, it is evident that plurality and domestic
servitude will extend--

"Far into summers which we shall not see;"

in fact, till some violent revolution of society shall have
introduced a servant class.

The three grades of Mpongwe may be considered as rude beginnings
of caste. The first are the "Sons of the Soil," the "Ongwa ntye"
(contracted from Onwana wi ntye), Mpongwes of pure blood; the
second are the "Mbamba," children of free-men by serviles; and
lastly, "Nshaka," in Bakele "Nshaka," represents the slaves. M.
du Chaillu's distribution (chap, iii.) into five orders, namely,
pure, mixed with other tribes, half free, children of serviles,
and chattels, is somewhat over-artificial; at any rate, now it is
not generally recognized. Like the high-caste Hindu, the nobler
race will marry women of lower classes; for instance, King
Njogoni's mother was a Benga; but the inverse proceeding is a
disgrace to the woman, apparently an instinctive feeling on the
part of the reproducer, still lingering in the most advanced
societies. Old travellers record a belief that, unlike all other
Guinea races, the Mpongwe marries his mother, sister, or
daughter; and they compare the practice with that of the polished
Persians and the Peruvian Incas, who thus kept pure the solar and