mbique. From there he sees the slave-dhows in the
harbor, the jungles on the mainland through which the slaves came by
the thousands, and still come one by one, and the ancient palaces of
the Portuguese governors, dead now some hundreds of years, to whom
this trade in human agony brought great wealth, and no loss of
honor.

[Illustration: Chain-gangs of Petty Offenders Outside of Zanzibar.]

Mozambique in the days of her glory was, with Zanzibar, the great
slave-market of East Africa, and the Portuguese and the Arabs who
fattened on this traffic built themselves great houses there, and a
fortress capable, in the event of a siege, of holding the garrison
and all the inhabitants as well. To-day the slave-trade brings to
those who follow it more of adventure than of financial profit, but
the houses and the official palaces and the fortress still remain,
and they are, in color, indescribably beautiful. Blue and pink and
red and light yellow are spread over their high walls, and have been
so washed and chastened by the rain and sun, that the whole city has
taken on the faint, soft tints of a once brilliant water-color. The
streets themselves are unpeopled, empty and strangely silent. Their
silence is as impressive as their beauty. In the heat of the day,
which is from sunrise to past sunset, you see no one, you hear no
footfall, no voices, no rumble of wheels or stamp of horses' hoofs.
The bare feet of the native, who is the only human being who dares
to move abroad, makes no sound, and in Mozambique there are no
carriages and no horses. Two bullock-carts, which collect scraps and
refuse from the white staring streets, are the only carts in the
city, and with the exception of a dozen 'rikshas are the only
wheeled vehicles the inhabitants have seen.

I have never visited a city which so impressed one with the fact
that, in appearance, it had remained just as it was four hundred
years before. There is no decay, no ruins, no sign of disuse; it is,
on the contrary, clean and brilliantly beautiful in color, with
dancing blue waters all about it, and with enormous palms moving
above the towering white walls and red tiled roofs, but it is a city
of the dead. The open-work iron doors, with locks as large as
letter-boxes, are closed, the wooden window-shutters are barred, and
the wares in the shops are hidden from the sidewalk by heavy
curtains. There is a park filled with curious trees and with flowers
of gorgeous color, but th