M. Valdez (ii. 221 et passim), writes “Clincufo,” which he has taken from a misprint in Monteiro and Gamitto.  The chingufu of East Africa is a hollow box performed upon with a drum-stick of caoutchouc.  The pipes are wooden tubes with sundry holes and a bridge below the mouth-piece; they are played over edge like our flutes.  The “hellish harmonies” mostly result from an improvised band, one strumming the guitar, another clapping the sticks, and the third beating the bell-shaped irons that act as castanets.

The language of the people on and near the Congo River is called “Fiote,” a term used by old travellers to denote a black man as opposed to Mundele (white), and also applied to things, as Bondefiote or black baft.  James Barbot (p. 512) gives specimens of some thirty-three words and the numerals in the “Angoy language, spoken at Cabinde,” which proves to be that of the River.  Of these many are erroneous:  for instance, “nova,” to sleep (ku-nua); “sursu,” a hen (nsusu):  while “fina,” scarlet; “bayeta,” baize; and “fumu,” tobacco, are corrupted Portuguese.  A young lad, “muleche” (moleque), Father Merolla’s “molecchas, a general name among the negroes,” for which Douville prefers “moleke” (masc.) and “molecka” (fem.), is applied only to a slave, and in this sense it has extended west of the Atlantic.  In the numerals, “wale” (2) should be “kwale,” “quina” (4) “kuya,” and “evona” (9) “iowa.”  We may remark the pentenary system of the Windward Coast and the Gaboon negroes; e.g., 6 is “sambano” ("mose” and “tano” 1 + 5), and 7 is “sambwale” ("mose” and “kwale”) and so forth, whilst “kumi” (10), possibly derived from neighbouring races, belongs to the decimal system.

The first attempt at a regular vocabulary was made by Douville, (vol. iii. p. 261):  “Vocabidaire de la Langue Mogialoua, et des deux dialectcs principaux Abunda (Angolan) et Congo” (Fiote); it is also very incorrect.  The best is that published in Appendix No.  I. to the Congo Expedition, under the name of “Embomma;” we may quote the author’s final remark:  “This vocabulary I do not consider to be free from mistakes which I cannot now find time to discover.  All the objects of the senses are, however, correct.”  M. Parrot showed me a Ms. left at Banana Point by a French medical officer, but little could be said in its praise.  Monteiro and Gamitto (pp. 479-480) give seventeen “Conguez” words, and the Congo numerals as opposed to the “Bundo.”

The Fiote is a member of the great South African family; some missionaries argued, from its beauty and richness, that it had formerly been written, but of this there is no proof.  M. Malte-Brun supposes the Congoese dialects to indicate “a meditative genius foreign to the habitual condition of these people,” ignoring the fact that the most complicated and laborious tongues are those of barbarous nations, whilst modern civilization in variably labours to simplify.  It is copious; every place, tree, shrub, or plant