Maryland independent. [volume] (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1874-current, 1892-03-25
DARKEST AFRICA.
A STRANGE RACE IN THAT MYs-
FERROUS CONTINENT.
Huge Caverns Inhabited by a Chou
lish Sort of Peopie-L.ves
Spent Underground-A
Strange Spectacle.

Il -O---N
to him.
"The most remarkable country il
Africa is way down in Katanga. 1t i:
the place where copper comes from, aud
there are great caves in the hills, so high
that, il we were riding through them on
these camels we could not touch the roof
with our spears, and people live in them.
One of these caves is 400 yards wide,
and it took us from sunrise till noon to
march through it, and we came out oil
the hill on the other side.
1t was thirty years ago that Colonel
Grant heard this remarkable story. II
is curious confidence that during the
very week of his death, last month, there
came to Brussels the preliminary report
of Lieutenant Lc Blarinel, announcing
that ne had visited the caves of Katsnga
and seen the people who inhabit them.
He approached these hills, which rise
about 5000 feet above the sea, from the
northwest. Another explorer, Mr..
Arnot, has visited them from the south,
and both sides of these mountain ranges
are found to be dotted with the mouths
OF caverns, the dark homes of some
thousands of people.
lie Marinel says these troglodytes are
known as the Bena- KabamDo. Many Of
their caves are not inhabited, but are
simply places of refuge. The openings
are so carefully hidden among the rocks
or in the underorush that it is hardly
possible TO find them; but scores of in
habited caves are scattered, like rabbit
warrens, along the TANKS of the hills and
can be seen from distance. The people
Mslri, one of the most powerful native
rulers in America. The troglodytes,
alone among his subjects, have for years
defed his tax gatherers. The Kings
army several times marched against them
in vain. When their hills were invaded
the people simply retreated into the
bowels of the earth. Interior passages
connect their caves, and they can come
to the light again far from the place
where they vanished into the blackness
of their underground homes. LIE Mariuel
says, however, that Msirl has at last
thoroughly cowed his rebellious subjects.
They pay him tribute now, though there
is little for the tax-gathersrs to collect,
because the King left them hardly goat
when he conquered them.
The hills of Katanga, where these
cave-dwellers live, are among the loftiest
and coolest parts of tropical Africa.
Water sometimes freezes in the night.
LIE Marinel says the Bena- Kabambo are
the most ferocious savages he ever met.
They are afraid the secret of their grot-
toes will be fathomed, aud the explorer
was not permitted to enter them. Aruot
had the same experience on the south side
of the hills. He fingered in the neigh
borhood for days, fed the multitude on
hippopotami and antelope aud won their
friendship; but no bride tempted them
to admit him to their subterrancan re-
treats. He was permitted only to peer
| in at the openings where the walls had
the appearance of pumice stone. No one
| yet knows how large they are. Arnot
says, however, that one OF the caves has
two mouths, the distance between the
openings being FIVE miles. Water flows
from many of the openings. There is
little doubt that they arc natural caves
| produced by erosion, and some of them,
perhaps, artifcially enlarged and con-
nected. Scattered all over this rugged
region live these natives, in the largest
caves used as the abode OF man, herding
flocks in their retreats, filling millet
fields in the valley below. They are al
ways alert to detect signs of danger,
when, as a rule, they vanish from view,
the earth swallowing them up beyond the
ken of their foes.
A little further west in Tunis, about
forty miles from the sea, French soldiers
discovered, two years ago, the largest
villages of cave-dwellers known in mod
ern times. They have since been visited
by several explorers, including Mr.
Hamy, the anthropologist. The people
are called the Matmatmas, and their two
villages, in parallel valleys, contain about
1000 people. You might enter ono of
these valleys and not know until you
were right upon the caves tibet > human
beng lived there, part OF the populace
being off over the hills with their herds,
and the rest busted underground with
their pottery making and house duties.
The caves are excavated IN the lime.
stone hills. Dwellings, stables. work.
shops, everything, is underground. The
bare, limestone walls of these sabter.
ranean rooms are marked with deep
scratches, made BY the pick-axes that
dug them out. Near the ceiling shelves
are excayated, on which provisions are
stored. We descend 10 the entrance by
a short ladder in an almost perpendicular
shaft upon which fronts the doorway.
the only source of light and ventilation.
The people inter their deal in shallow
trenches, almost on the suriaee. It is a
strange spectacls-thc dead occupying