Note 64 — Chapter XV

On the other hand, the notorious Queen Zinga, or Jinga of Angola, as she is called by the old travellers, daughter of the King who died in 1640, kept, we are told, about her Court, fifty or sixty young men for amatory purposes, dressed and named like women, whilst she assumed the male dress and name; a touching tribute to the superiority of masculine human nature in the mind of the feminine. The Court of Loango offered a third anomaly, truly typical of the childish African brain. The Macouda, a female officer of high rank, cohabited with any man of her choice; the issue was accounted blood royal; and if her concubators were unfaithful, death was their penalty. A touching tribute to the superiority of the female in those regions. In Dahome the woman is officially superior; but under other considerations, she still suffers from male arrogance. The King has repeatedly said to me, that a woman is still a woman. And when the Amazons boast that they are not women but men, they stand self-convicted of the fact, that however near to equality the sexes are, there is still always a somewhat of preponderance of the active over the passive half of humanity.