Stanley in Africa

Irebu was now passed, and then the mouth of the Bauil, whose people are a piratical crew, dreaded by all their neighbors. By September 29th the flotilla was at Equator Station again, after an absence of one hundred days. What a transformation! The jungle and scrub had disappeared, and in their stead was a solid clay house, roomy, rain-proof and bullet-proof, well lighted and furnished. Around it were the neat clay huts of the colored carriers and soldiers, each the centre of a garden where grew corn, sugar-cane, sweet potatoes, pumpkins, cucumbers, etc. Then there was a grand garden, full of onions, radishes, carrots, beans, peas, beets, lettuce, potatoes and cabbages, and also a servants’ hall, goat-houses, fowl-houses and all the et-ceteras of an African plantation. It was Stanley’s ideal of a Congo station, and sight of it gave him greater heart for his enterprise than any thing he had yet seen. The native chief, Ikengé, was at first disposed to be troublesome, but was soon appeased. On October 11th Stanley congratulated himself that he had passed so much of the river limit, leaving peace behind him with all the nations, and stations abounding in means of support, if they exerted themselves in the right direction.

Equator Station is 757 miles from the Atlantic Ocean and 412 miles above Leopoldville, on Stanley Pool. Stanley’s initial work was really done here, but in response to earnest wishes from Brussels, he continued it in the same spirit and for the same purpose for 600 miles further, with a view of making a permanent station at Stanley Falls. With 68 colored men and 5 Europeans on board, and with his steamers well freighted with necessaries, he left Equator Station on October 16th. The first place of moment passed was at Uranga, near the confluence of the Lulunga with the Congo. The country around is flat, densely wooded, and the villages close together. The Uranga people were anxious for a landing and palaver, but the steamers pushed on to Bolombo, where a famine prevailed, and where the natives were peaceable and anxious to make blood-brotherhood.

Above Bolombo the steamers were met by a fleet of canoes, whose occupants bore the news that the Bengala were anxious for a stop and palaver. These were the terrible fighters who harassed Stanley so sorely on his descent of the Congo in 1877. He had heard further down the river that they had threatened to dispute every inch of water with the white man if ever he came that way again. But he had also heard from Mangombo, of Irebu, that the lesson they had learned was so severe that all the white men would have to do would be to shake a stick at them. Still Stanley approached anxiously. The Bengala villages stretch for miles along the Congo. He did not stop his steamers, which were soon surrounded by hundreds of canoes, but kept slowly moving past the countless villages for fully five hours. The canoe-men seemed impelled wholly by curiosity, and no sign of hostility appeared. The guide held frequent talks with the natives, none of which evoked other than friendly replies. They are a tall, broad-shouldered, graceful people, shading off from a dark bronze to a light complexion. The steamers came to a halt for the night at an island, two hours’ sail from the upper end of the villages, and 500 yards from the shore, and thither the guide came in the evening with a young chief, Boleko, who invited a landing the next day. In the morning he came with an escort of canoes and took Stanley to his village, through the identical channel whence had issued the hostile canoes in 1877. Here trading was carried on briskly and satisfactorily, till a message came from old Mata Bwyki to the effect that he regarded it as an insult on the part of a boy like Boleko to be extending the tribal honors in that way. The only way out of this was for the steamers to drop back two miles and spend a day opposite the village of the old chief – Lord-of-many-guns. Old Mata was found to be a Herculean fellow, nearly eighty years old, and walking with a staff that resembled a small mast. By his side appeared seven sons, all fine-looking fellows, but the gray shock of the old man towered above them all when he straightened himself up. Around them was a throng which numbered thousands. The assembly place and place of welcome was laid with grass mats. Stanley and his men marched into it, ogled on every side, and not knowing whether the end would be peace or war. The guide presented them with a speech which described Stanley’s work and objects – all he had done below them on the river, the advantages it would be to treat and trade with him, winding up with an intimation that it might be dangerous, or at least useless, to prove unfriendly, for his steamers were loaded with guns and ammunition sufficient for the extermination of the entire people. The result was a treaty, sealed with blood-brotherhood, and a promise on the part of Stanley to return at no distant day and establish a permanent station among the Bengala. This village was Iboko.

The Congo here is literally filled with islands which render a passage from one shore to the other almost impossible. These islands are all richly verdure-clad and present a scene of rare loveliness, draped in a vegetable life that finds a parallel no where else in nature. It took the steamers thirteen hours to work their way across to the left, or Mutembo side. But Mutembo was deserted. The steamers made Mkatakura, through channels bordered with splendid copal forests, whose tops were covered with orchilla – fortunes for whole civilized nations, if possessed and utilized. Mkatakura was also deserted. Where were these people? Their places had been populous and hostile in 1877. Had they fallen a prey to stronger tribes? Alas! such must have been their fate in a country where wars never end, and where provocations are the slightest.

Many deserted settlements were now passed, when Mpa, ruled by Iunga, was reached, 744 miles from Leopoldville. The people were peaceful and disposed to make all necessary concessions. The next day brought them to Nganza, ruled by old Rubanga, who had received Stanley with cordiality in 1877. The people were exceedingly anxious to trade, and offered their wares, especially their ivory, of which they had plenty, at ridiculously low figures. The people are known as the Langa-langa – the upper country – and they go almost entirely naked. Their bodies are cross-marked and tattooed. The country is regarded as a paradise for ivory traders, owing to the ignorance of the natives as to the real commercial value of the article. Here is the turning-point in African currency. The cloth and brass-rods of the Atlantic coast no longer hold good, but the Canton bead and the cowry of Ujiji are the measure of exchange. Langa-langa is therefore the commercial water-shed which divides the Atlantic and Pacific influence.

On November 4th Ikassa was passed, whose people fled on the approach of the steamers. It was the same at Yakongo. Then came a series of deserted villages. Presently appeared the newly-settled towns of Ndobo and Ibunda, with their wattled huts. Bumba came next, with whose chief, Myombi, blood-brotherhood was made amid a throng of curious sight-seers. It was the fiftieth time Stanley’s arm had been punctured for treaty purposes since he entered upon his journey. There was little opportunity for trading here owing to the curiosity of the people over the steamers. They could hardly be persuaded that the dreaded Ibanza – devil – did not live down in the boats. It must be he who required so much wood for food and gave such groans. If not, what was it that lived in that great iron drum and made those wheels spin round so rapidly? In this mood they forgot the art of exchange so natural with African natives. Their curiosity was such that the crowds about and upon the steamers became not only a drawback to exchange, but to work. At length one of the cabin-boys tried the effect of a practical joke. He opened the cabin door and pushed forward the form of a splendid Bengal tiger, as Ibanza, which was creating all the noise and trouble in the boat. The frightened natives shrieked and ran at glance of the terrible figure, and the river bank was cleared in a moment. Yells of laughter followed them from the boat’s crew. Being assured by this that nothing harmful was intended, they began to cluster back, and really joined heartily in the merriment, as they saw that the source of their terror was only a tiger skin hurriedly stuffed for the purpose of giving them a scare. Trade was more active after that, and provisions were plenty.

Above Bomba the steamers neared the equally populous town of Yambinga. The chief was Mukuga, who wore an antelope-skin cap adorned with cock’s feathers, a broad shoulder-belt with leopard-skin attachment, and strings of tags, tassels and fetish mysteries. He was a timid chief, notwithstanding his gaudy apparel, and quite willing to make blood brotherhood. All of these later villages were plentifully supplied with war-canoes, the count being 556 at Lower and Upper Yambinga, and 400 at Buruba.

Above Yambinga the flotilla got lost in an affluent of the Congo and had to put back to the main stream. The stream was supposed to be the Itimbiri. For many days both shores of the Congo had not appeared at once. But on the 12th both sides could be seen, and on the right was a wide plain once inhabited by the Yalulima, a tribe of artisans skilled in the manufacture of iron, including swords, spears, bells and fetishes of various devices. On an island above dwelt the Yambungu, who were disposed to trade and who brought fine sweet-potatoes, fowls, eggs, and a species of sheep with broad, flat tails.

The districts were now very populous, and the affluents frequent and very complicated as to name and direction of flow. The Basaka, Bahamba and Baru villages were passed without a stop. At all of these there were canoe demonstrations, but whether for hostile purpose or not was not inquired after. The flotilla was now nearing the great Congo affluent, the Aruwimi, out of whose mouth issued the enormous canoe-fleet which so nearly annihilated Stanley in 1877. He gave orders to be on the alert, but to resort to hostilities only when all hope of self-preservation otherwise had failed. Scarcely had these orders passed when a stream of long, splendid-looking war-canoes, filled with armed men, dashed out from behind an island, and began to reconnoitre the steamers. They pushed over to the right bank, and kept an upward course, without show of resistance and at a safe distance. The steamers plunged ahead, and soon the mouth of the Aruwimi opened its spacious jaws to receive them. High on the bank appeared the town of Mokulu, whose Basoko inmates had fought the battle with Stanley years before. He knew their disposition then, but what was it now? Was the meeting to be one of war or friendship?

The Congo has a majestic flow where it receives its great tributary, the Aruwimi. Rounding a point, the steamers entered the affluent, to find the villagers in force, dressed in war-paint, armed with spear and shield, beating their war-drums, and disporting themselves fantastically on the banks. The canoes of observation were speedily joined by others. The three steamers were put across to a clearing on the divide between the Congo and Aruwimi, and two of them brought to anchor. The Eu Avant was then steamed up the Aruwimi past Mokulu. Then her head was turned down stream, and the guide was stationed on the cabin to proclaim the words of peace and friendship as the steamer slowly returned. The drums on shore ceased to beat. The battle-horns were hushed. The leaping forms were still. The guide was eloquent in his speech and dramatic in his action. He had the ear of all Mokulu. At length a response came that if all the steamers anchored together, the Basoko would soon come as friends. The canoes hovered about, but could not be persuaded to come within 250 yards. Hours elapsed before they mustered up sufficient courage to approach the shore within hailing distance of the camps at the anchorage. Thither the guide and three companions went, and the ceremony of blood-brotherhood was performed. The town of Mokulu heard the shouts of satisfaction at this result, and a response came in the shape of drum-beats and horn-toots. Intercourse with the fierce Basoko was a possibility.

These Basokos received Stanley’s guide, Yumbila, first and loaded him with presents. They then told him of Stanley’s former approach and battle, also of a second visitation far worse than Stanley’s, which must have been one by an Arab gang of slave-stealers, judging from its barbarity. They were averse to a journey up the Aruwimi, though willing that the expedition should proceed up the Congo. It was impossible to get information from them respecting their river. They proved to be willing traders, and possessed products in abundance. Their spears, knives, paddles and shields showed remarkable workmanship, being delicately polished, and carved with likenesses of lizards, crocodiles, canoes, fish and buffaloes. Their headdresses were of fine palm materials, decorated, and a knit haversack formed a shoulder-piece for each man. Physically they are a splendid people, industrious after their style, fond of fishing, and not given to that ignorant, childish curiosity so common among other tribes. They are adepts at canoe construction, and some of their vessels require a hundred stout warriors to propel them in a fight.

Notwithstanding opposition, Stanley determined to explore the Aruwimi, which is 1,600 yards wide at its mouth, and narrows to 900 yards above Mokula. He found in succession the Umaneh, the Basongo, the Isombo, all populous, timid, and friendly. After passing Yambua and Irungu, he came to the quite populous metropolis of Yambumba, on a bluff 40 feet high, containing 8,000 people living in steeply conical huts, embowered by bombax, palms, banana-trees and fig-trees. The puffing of the steamers put the whole town to flight. Further on came the rapids of the river and the Yambuya people and town. These shrewd people declined to trade on the plea of poverty, and even refused to give the correct name of their village. Their appearance belied their assertions. Stanley found the rapids of the Aruwimi a bar to steam navigation. They are 96 miles from the mouth of the river, which runs nearly westward thus far. It was this brief exploration of the river which determined him to use it as a route to Albert Nyanza on his search for Emin Pasha. Should it keep its course and continue its volume, it could not but find a source far to the east in the direction of the lake, and very near to its shores. As one of the fatalities which overhang explorers, Stanley mistook it for the Welle, described by Schweinfurth, just as Livingstone mistook the Lualaba for the Nile.

This Welle, or Wellemakua, river about which Stanley indulges in surmises, is the celebrated river brought into notice by Schweinfurth’s discoveries, and over which a geographical controversy raged for seventeen years. The question was whether it was the Shari river, which emptied into Lake Tchad, or whether its mysterious outlet was further south. Stanley’s last journey in search of Emin Pasha pretty definitely settled the controversy by ascertaining that the Welle is the upper course of the Mobangi, a tributary of the Congo.

And while speaking of Schweinfurth, we must use him as authority to settle any misapprehension likely to arise respecting the nature of the dwarfs which Stanley encountered on the waters of the Upper Aruwimi. He calls them Monbuttus, thereby giving the impression that the tribe is one of dwarfs. It was Schweinfurth’s province to set at rest the long disputed question of the existence of a dwarf race in Central Africa. He proved, once for all, that Herodotus and Aristotle were not dealing with fables when they wrote of the pygmies of Central Africa. One day he suddenly found himself surrounded by what he conjectured was a crowd of impudent boys, who pointed their arrows at him, and whose manner betokened intentional disrespect. He soon learned that these hundreds of little fellows were veritable dwarfs, and were a part of the army of Munza, the great Monbuttu king. These are the now famous Akka, who, so far as we know, are the smallest of human beings. It is these same Akka who, wandering in the forest a little south of Schweinfurth’s route, picked off many a carrier in Stanley’s late expedition, using arrows whose points were covered with a deadly poison, and refusing all overtures of friendship.

Schweinfurth’s description of the Niam-Niams (Great-Eaters) and of their southern neighbors, the Monbuttus, is the best that has yet appeared in print. He approached the country through the powerful Dinka tribes on the north, whom he found rich in cattle, experts in iron-working and highly proficient in the art of pottery ornamentation, especially as to their smoking-pipes. Competent authorities agree with his opinion that the ornamental designs upon their potteries and iron and copper wares, now exhibited in the Berlin Museum of Ethnology, would not discredit a European artist, and among these people, so far advanced in some respects, Schweinfurth discovered the first evidences of cannibalism which is said to prevail, on very doubtful authority, however, in a very large part of the Congo Basin. It is a noteworthy fact that, in all his travels, Livingstone never saw evidence of this revolting practice except on one or two occasions, and in all his voluminous writings he hardly refers to the topic. Dr. Junker, however, draws a distinction between the Niam-Niam and Monbuttu cannibals which Schweinfurth in his briefer visit failed to observe. Junker says the Niam-Niam use human flesh as food only because they believe that in this way they acquire the bravery and other virtues with which their victims may have been endowed. The Monbuttu, on the other hand, make war upon their neighbors for no other purpose than to procure human flesh for food, because they delight in it as a part of their cuisine. With methodical care they dry the flesh they do not immediately use, and add it to their reserve supplies of food.

Schweinfurth’s journey into Niam-Niam was through a prairie land covered with the tallest grasses he had yet seen in Africa. The people are given to cattle-raising and the chase. They are not of stalwart size, and their color is dark-brown rather than black. What they lack in stature they make up in athletic qualities. They took a keen interest in showing the traveler their sights, and in the evening regaled his camp with music, dispensed by a grotesque singer, who accompanied his attenuated voice with a local guitar of thin, jingling sound. The drums and horns of the Niam-Niams are used only for war purposes. Everything testified to the fruitfulness of the soil. Sweet potatoes and yams were piled up in the farmsteads, and circular receptacles of clay for the preservation of corn were erected upon posts in the yards. The yards are surrounded by hedges of paradise figs; back of these are the plantations of manioc and maize, and beyond their fields of eleusine. The women are modest and retiring in the presence of white men, and their husbands hold them in high respect. The people are great believers in magic. The best shots, when they have killed an unusual number of antelopes or buffaloes, are credited with having charmed roots in their possession. The Niam-Niam country is important as being the water-shed between the Nile and the rivers which run westward into the Congo, the Welle being the largest, which runs nearly parallel with the recently discovered Aruwimi. The Niam-Niam are great ivory traders and take copper, cloth, or trinkets at a cheap figure for this valuable ware. The southern and western part of their country becomes densely wooded and the trees are gigantic. Here the shape of the huts change, becoming loftier and neater, the yards having posts in them for displaying trophies of war and the chase. The characteristics of the Niam-Niam are pronounced and they can be identified at once amidst the whole series of African races.

Every Niam-Niam soldier carries a lance, trumbash, and dagger, made by their own smiths. Wooing is dependent on a payment exacted from the suitor by the father of the intended bride. When a man resolves on matrimony, he applies to the sub-chieftain who helps him to secure his wife. In spite of the practice of polygamy, the marriage bond is sacred, and unfaithfulness is generally punished with death. The trait is paramount for this people to show consistent affection for their wives. Schweinfurth doubts the charge of cannibalism brought against this people, and thinks their name “Great Eaters” might have given rise to the impression that they were “man-eaters.”

The festivities that occur in case of marriage are a bridal procession, at the head of which the chieftain leads the bride to the home of her future husband, accompanied by musicians, minstrels and jesters. A feast is given, of which all partake in common, though in general the women are accustomed to eat alone in their huts. This marriage celebration, with slight variations, is usual with the tribes of Central Africa. Livingstone describes one among the Hamees of the Lualaba river, in which the bride is borne to the home of her husband on the shoulders of her lover or chieftain. The domestic duties of a Niam-Niam wife consist mainly in cultivating the homestead, preparing the daily meals, painting her husband’s body and dressing his hair. Children require very little care in this genial climate, being carried about in a band or scarf till old enough to walk, and then left to run about with very little clothing on.

They are lovers of music, as are their neighbors, especially the Bongo people, who possess a variety of quaint instruments capable of producing fairly tuneful concerts. Their language is an up-shoot of the great root which is the original of every native tongue in Africa north of the Equator. They always consult auguries before going to war. In grief for the dead they shave their heads. A corpse is adorned for burial in dyed skins and feathers. They bury the dead with scrupulous regard to the points of the compass, the men facing the east and the women the west.

Stanley now steamed back to the Congo, and once more breasted its yellow flood. He was now in the true heart of Africa, 1,266 miles from the sea and 921 from Leopoldville, and upon a majestic flood capable of carrying a dozen rivers like the Aruwimi. It was a region of deep, impenetrable forests, fertile soil, and few villages, for the fierce Bahunga seemed to have terrorized and devastated all the shores. The river abounds in large, fertile islands, the homes of fishermen and stalwart canoemen, who carry their products to clearings on the shores, and there exchange them for the inland products. This makes the shore clearings kind of market-places – sometimes peopled and sometimes deserted.

In the distance a fleet of canoes is sighted, bearing down on the steamers. Are they the hostile Bahunga? The En Avant is sent forward on a reconnoissance, and soon makes out the fleet to consist of a thousand canoes, extending a mile and a half in length. Five men to a canoe gave a force of 5,000 men, an army of sufficient size to overwhelm a hundred such tiny steamers as composed the Stanley flotilla. A storm arose, accompanied by vivid lightning and heavy thunder shocks. The elements cleared the river of all fragile barks and left the steamers to their course.

The old town of Mawembé came into view. It was not such as Stanley had mapped it, but a burned and nearly deserted spot. The Arab slave merchant had evidently penetrated thus far, and these ashes were the marks of his cruelty. Another town, higher up, and entirely in ashes, proved the sad conjecture to be true, for before it sat at least 200 woe-begone natives, too abject in their desolation to even affect curiosity at the approaching steamers. On being hailed, they told the pitiful tale of how a strange people, like those in the steamers, and wearing white clothes, had come upon them in the night, slaughtered their people, and carried off their women and children. The fleet of canoes, seen among the islands below, contained their own people, gathered for protection, forced to live on the islands in the day-time and to go ashore at night for food. All this had happened but eight days before, and the marauders had retreated up the river in the direction of Stanley Falls.

A few miles above, the charred stakes, upright canoes, poles of huts, scorched banana groves and prostrate palms indicated the ruins of the site of Yavunga, the twelfth devastated town and eighth community passed since leaving the mouth of the Aruwimi. Opposite Yavunga were the Yaporo, a populous tribe, but now stricken by fire, sword and famine as were their brothers. These had charged on Stanley six years before, but they were now in no mood to dispute his way.

Floating by is an object which attracts attention. A boat-hook is thrown over, and to it clings the forms of two women bound together by a cord. The ghastly objects are raised, and a brief inspection shows that they could not have been drowned more than twelve hours before. The steamers push on, round a point, and in the distance appear white objects. A glass is brought to bear, and they prove to be the tents of the Arab thieves. They are from Nyangwé, above the Falls, the capital of Tippoo Tib’s empire, unholy conquest from the Manyuema people, founded in flame, murder and kidnapping. The camp was palisaded and the banks were lined with canoes, evidence that the marauders had managed somehow to pass the Falls in force. The first impulse of Stanley was to attempt a rescue and wreak a deserved vengeance on these miscreants. But on second thought, his was a mission of peace, and he was without authority to administer justice. He represented no constituted government, but was on a mission to found a government. To play the rolé of judge or executioner in such an emergency might be to defeat all his plans and forever leave these wretches without a strong arm to cling to in time of future need. Had he come upon an actual scene of strife and burning, it would have been his to aid the weaker party, but now the law of might must have its way, till a sturdier justice than was at his disposal could come to tread in majesty along those dark forest aisles.

And now what a meeting and greeting there was! The steamers signalled the arrival of strangers. A canoe put out from the shore and hailed in the language of the Eastern coast. Both sides understood that the meeting was one of peace. The steamers made for shore below the tents, and a night encampment was formed. Soon Stanley’s Zanzibaris were shaking hands with the Manyuema slaves of Abed bin Salim, who constituted the band that had been ravaging the country to obtain slaves and ivory. They had been out for sixteen months, and for eleven months had been raiding the Congo. The extent of country they had plundered was larger than Ireland, and contained a population of 1,000,000 souls. They numbered 300 men, armed with shot-guns and rifles, and their retinue of domestic slaves and women doubled their force. Their camp, even then, was on the ruins of the town of Yangambi, which had fallen before their torches, and many of whose people were prisoners on the spot where they were born.

Stanley took a view of the stockade in which they had confined their human booty. This is the horrible story as he writes it:

“The first general impressions are that the camp is much too densely peopled for comfort. There are rows upon rows of dark nakedness, relieved here and there by the white dresses of the captors. There are lines or groups of naked forms upright, standing or moving about listlessly; naked bodies are stretched under the sheds in all positions; naked legs innumerable are seen in the perspective of prostrate sleepers; there are countless naked children, many were infants, forms of boyhood and girlhood, and occasionally a drove of absolutely naked old women, bending under a basket of fuel, or cassava tubers, or bananas, who are driven through the moving groups by two or three musketeers. In paying more attention to details, I observe that mostly all are fettered; youths with iron rings around their necks, through which a chain like one of our boat-anchor chains is rove, securing the captives by twenties. The children over ten are secured by three copper rings, each ringed leg brought together by the central ring, which accounts for the apparent listlessness of movement I observed on first coming in presence of the curious scene. The mothers are secured by shorter chains, around whom their respective progeny of infants are grouped, hiding the cruel iron links that fall in loops or festoons over mamma’s breasts. There is not one adult man-captive amongst them.

“Besides the shaded ground strewn over so thickly by the prostrate and upright bodies of captives, the relics of the many raids lie scattered or heaped up in profusion everywhere, and there is scarcely a square foot of ground not littered with something, such as drums, spears, swords, assegais, arrows, bows, knives, iron ware of native make of every pattern, paddles innumerable, scoops and balers, wooden troughs, ivory horns, whistles, buffalo and antelope horns, ivory pestles, wooden idols, beads of wood, berries, scraps of fetishism, sorcerers’ wardrobes, gourds of all sizes, nets, from the lengthy seine to the small hand-net; baskets, hampers, shields as large as doors (of wood or of plaited rattan), crockery, large pots to hold eight gallons, down to the child’s basin; wooden mugs, basins, and mallets; grass cloth in shreds, tatters and pieces; broken canoes, and others half-excavated; native adzes, hatchets, hammers, iron rods, etc., etc. All these littering the ground, or in stacks and heaps, with piles of banana and cassava peelings, flour of cassava, and sliced tubers drying, make up a number of untidy pictures and details, through all of which, however, prominently gleam the eyes of the captives in a state of utter and supreme wretchedness.

“Little perhaps as my face betrayed my feelings, other pictures would crowd upon the imagination; and after realizing the extent and depth of the misery presented to me, I walked about as in a kind of dream, wherein I saw through the darkness of the night the stealthy forms of the murderers creeping towards the doomed town, its inmates all asleep, and no sounds issuing from the gloom but the drowsy hum of chirping cicadas or distant frogs – when suddenly flash the light of brandished torches; the sleeping town is involved in flames, while volleys of musketry lay low the frightened and astonished people, sending many through a short minute of agony to that soundless sleep from which there will be no waking. I wished to be alone somewhere where I could reflect upon the doom which has overtaken Bandu, Yomburri, Yangambi, Yaporo, Yakusu, Ukanga, Yakonda, Ituka, Yaryembi, Yaruche, populous Isangi, and probably thirty scores of other villages and towns.

“The slave-traders admit they have only 2,300 captives in this fold, yet they have raided through the length and breadth of a country larger than Ireland, bearing fire and spreading carnage with lead and iron. Both banks of the river show that 118 villages and 43 districts have been devastated, out of which is only educed this scant profit of 2,300 females and children, and about 2,000 tusks of ivory! The spears, swords, bows, and the quivers of arrows show that many adults have fallen. Given that these 118 villages were peopled only by 1,000 each, we have only a profit of two per cent.; and by the time all these captives have been subjected to the accidents of the river voyage to Kirundu and Nyangwé, of camp-life and its harsh miseries, to the havoc of small-pox and the pests which miseries breed, there will only remain a scant one per cent. upon the bloody venture.

“They tell me, however, that the convoys already arrived at Nyangwé with slaves captured in the interior have been as great as their present band. Five expeditions have come and gone with their booty of ivory and slaves, and these five expeditions have now completely weeded the large territory described above. If each expedition has been as successful as this, the slave-traders have been enabled to send 5,000 women and children safe to Nyangwé, Kirundu and Vibondo, above the Stanley Falls. Thus 5,000 out of an assumed million will be at the rate of a half per cent., or five slaves out of 1,000 people.

“This is poor profit out of such large waste of life, for originally we assume the slaves to have mustered about 10,000 in number. To obtain the 2,300 slaves out of the 118 villages they must have shot a round number of 2,500 people, while 1,300 more died by the wayside, through scant provisions and the intensity of their hopeless wretchedness. How many are wounded and die in the forest or droop to death through an overwhelming sense of their calamities, we do not know; but if the above figures are trustworthy, then the outcome from the territory with its million of souls is 5,000 slaves obtained at the cruel expense of 33,000 lives! And such slaves! They are females, or, young children who cannot run away, or who with youthful indifference, will soon forget the terrors of their capture! Yet each of the very smallest infants has cost the life of a father and perhaps his three stout brothers and three grown-up daughters. An entire family of six souls would have been done to death to obtain that small, feeble, useless child!

“These are my thoughts as I look upon the horrible scene. Every second during which I regard them the clink of fetters and chains strikes upon my ears. My eyes catch sight of that continual lifting of the hand to ease the neck in the collar, or as it displays a manacle exposed through a muscle being irritated by its weight or want of fitness. My nerves are offended with the rancid effluvium of the unwashed herds within this human kennel. The smell of other abominations annoys me in that vitiated atmosphere. For how could poor people, bound and riveted together by twenties, do otherwise than wallow in filth? Only the old women are taken out to forage. They dig out the cassava tuber, and search for the banana, while the guard, with musket ready, keenly watches for the coming of the vengeful native. Not much food can be procured in this manner, and what is obtained is flung down in a heap before each gang, to at once cause an unseemly scramble. Many of these poor things have been already months fettered in this manner, and their bones stand out in bold relief in the attenuated skin, which hangs down in thin wrinkles and puckers. And yet who can withstand the feeling of pity so powerfully pleaded for by those large eyes and sunken cheeks?

“What was the cause of all this vast sacrifice of human life – of all this unspeakable misery? Nothing but the indulgence of an old Arab’s ‘wolfish, bloody, starved and ravenous instincts.’ He wished to obtain slaves to barter away to other Arabs, and having weapons – guns and gunpowder – enough, he placed them in the hands of three hundred slaves, and despatched them to commit murder wholesale, just as an English nobleman would put guns in the hands of his guests and permit them to slaughter the game upon his estate. If we calculate three quarts of blood to each person who fell during the campaign of murder, we find that this one Arab caused to be shed 2,850 gallons of human blood, sufficient to fill a tank measurement of 460 cubic feet, quite large enough to have drowned him and all his kin!”

Nyangwé, above mentioned, is an important market-town on the Congo, some distance above Stanley Falls, and the capital of the undefined possessions of which Tippoo Tib holds sway. Livingstone says he has seen fully 3,000 people at the Nyanwe market of a clear day, anxious to dispose of their fish, fruits, vegetables and fowls. Many of them had walked twenty-five miles, bearing their baskets, heavily laden with produce, and some had come even further in canoes. On one occasion a riot broke out, instigated either by jealousy among the surrounding tribes or by the Arab slave-dealers for the purpose of making captures. Three burly fellows began to fire their guns into the throng of women, who hastily abandoned their wares and dashed for the canoes. The panic was so great that the canoes could not be manned and pushed into the river. The frantic women, fired into continually from the rear, leaped and scrambled over the boats and jumped wildly into the river, preferring the chances of a long swim to an island rather than inevitable destruction on the shore. Many of the wounded wretches threw up their hands in despair ere they reached mid-stream, and sank to rise no more. Rescuing canoes put out into the water, and many were thus saved; but one poor woman refused to be rescued, saying she would take her chances of life in the water rather than return to be sold as a slave. The Arabs estimate the slaughter that day at 400 souls.

Stanley now fully understood the meaning of all he had heard below of the terrible visitations of these banditti – of the merciless character of the Bahunga, which name they had misunderstood, and of the desire of the dwellers on the lower waters that he should ascend the Congo, thereby hoping that all the whites would destroy one another in the clash which seemed inevitable. After an exchange of gifts with these cut-throats and the loan of an interpreter to speak with the people at the Falls, the steamers departed from a scene which nature had made beautiful, but which the hand of man had stained with crime and blood. The Congo here has bluffy, picturesque shores on the one side, and on the other lowlands adapted for sugar-cane, cotton, rice and maize.

Some critics of Stanley have expressed wonder at his failure to assert his usual heroism when made to witness these Arab barbarities while ascending the Congo. They think he should have attacked and driven off these thieves and murderers, no matter what the result might have been to himself and his enterprise. The same, or a similar class of critics, think that when he was making his last journey up the Congo and the Aruwimi in search of Emin Pasha, he showed entirely too much consideration for the Arab marauders, and especially for that cunning and depraved official, Tippoo Tib, whom he recognized as governor at Nyangwé.

Despite what are regarded by some impulsive people as the higher claims of humanitarianism, we are perfectly willing to trust to Mr. Stanley’s sense of right as modified by the exigencies of a situation about which no one else can know as much as himself. That situation was altogether new and peculiar on both his ascents of the Congo in behalf of the Congo Free State, and in search of Emin Pasha. In the first instance he bore a commission from a higher power, the International Commission, whose agent he was. He had instructions to do certain things and to leave others undone. To provoke hostilities with those he met, to quarrel and fight, except in self-preservation, were not only things foreign to his mission, as being sure to defeat it, but were expressly forbidden to him. Conquest was no part of the new policy of the Congo Free State, but its foundation was peace and free concession by all the tribes within its boundaries. Time will vindicate his leniency in the midst of such scenes as he was forced to witness at the mouth of the Aruwimi and on the Congo above, during his first ascent of the river.

And the same will prove true of his second ascent. To be sure, he was on a different mission and had greater freedom of action, but he knew well, from former experience, the character of the peoples upon the two great rivers near their jurisdiction. And if any events ever proved the wisdom of the steps which a man took, those surely did which clustered about and composed the eventful, if melancholy, history of Stanley’s “Rear Guard” on the Aruwimi. Several correspondents, some of whom accompanied Stanley on his two up-river journeys, and others who have been over the ground, have written fully of the Aruwimi situation, and their views are valuable, though space forbids more than a condensation of them here.

A fatal river, say they all, was the Aruwimi for Stanley. It was so in 1877. 1883 served to recall regretful memories of his canoe descent, and introduced him to sadder scenes than he had ever occasioned or witnessed. The details of the deserted and blackened camp of his “Rear Guard” on the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition will prove to be more tragic than any which went before. It was close to the confluence of the Aruwimi with the Congo, as narrated elsewhere in this volume, that Stanly was compelled, in 1877, to storm a native village; and, as we have just seen, when he passed the spot again in 1883, what wonder that the dusky warriors reassembled to receive him! Round the bend “where the great affluent gaped into view,” the river was thronged with war-canoes, and on the banks stood the villages of Basongo and Mokulu, where Stanley’s ancient foes resided. In fantastic array appeared long lines of fully armed warriors – a land force supporting the fighting men afloat. How, aided by a picturesque and showy interpreter, with a voice as powerful as his eloquence, Stanley, on this latter occasion, appeased their warlike ardor and made them friends, has just been told in these pages.

The reader will understand, however, from the number of the force against him and the ferocious character of the tribes, why Stanley was so careful when forming his latest camp on the Aruwimi, to have it well stockaded and efficiently sentinelled. The local natives had not only the incentive of their previous defeat by Stanley to keep their hostility alive, but they had had meanwhile some bitter experiences of the Arab raider. They are splendid races of men, the tribes of the Mokulu and the Basoko, picturesque in their yellow war-paint, their barbaric shields and decorative headdresses. They are skilled workmen. Their paddles are beautifully carved, their spears and knives artistic and of dexterous shapeliness. They have also broadswords, and in a general way their weapons are of wonderful temper and sharpness. Now and then the Arab raiders find their work of massacre and plunder a hot business among such natives as these; but the advantage of the rifle is, of course, tremendous, and can only have one result. The Arabs do not, however, always have it entirely their own way. They leave both dead and wounded sometimes in the hands of the enemy, who frequently condemn both to the pot, and make merry, no doubt, over their grilled remains.

Among the many hardships of the Aruwimi camp, established by Stanley for his “Rear Guard,” on his latest upward trip, and left under Major Barttelot, was the uncontrollable character of the Manyema carriers and escort. These people have for many years been the slave-hunting allies of the Arabs – their jackals, their cheetahs; and the Stanley camp had actually to be spectators of the attack and raiding of a native village, opposite their own quarters, on the other side of the river. It was towards night when the onslaught began. The sudden sound of the warlike drums of the surprised natives came booming across the water, followed by the fierce rattle of the Arab musketry. Dark figures and light were soon mixed together in the fray. The natives fought bravely – but they fell rapidly before the rifle. Pelted with the deadly hail of shot, they were soon vanquished. Then from hut to hut the flames of ruin began to spread, and in the lurid light women and children were marched forth to the slave-hunter’s stockade – some to be ransomed next day by the remainder of the ivory the natives had successfully hidden; others probably to be passed on from hand to hand until they eventually reached a slave-dealing market. And all this the officers and comrades of Mr. Stanley had the humiliation to witness without daring to interfere – not from any fear of losing their lives in the defence of the weaker – a death which has been courted by thousands of brave men on land and sea – but for reasons of policy. They were not there to protect the natives of the Aruwimi from Arab raiders, but to follow Mr. Stanley with the stores necessary for the success of his expedition. Nor is it likely that the force under Major Barttelot would have obeyed him if he had desired to intervene. Mr. Stanley himself more than once in his African experience has had to shut his eyes to Arab aggression and cruelty, although his influence with Tippoo Tib has no doubt paved the way for the realization of his humane ambition in the matter of slavery. From their stockade and on board their launch at Yambuya, Barttelot and his comrades could see the woefully unequal warfare on the raided village, and there is no need of the assurance that their hearts beat high with indignation and a desire to take a hand in it. Moreover, these lawless brutalities practiced upon the natives made the difficulties of the camp all the greater, not only affecting the dangers of the advance, but increasing the perils of the way to the Falls, as was experienced by Ward on his travels to and fro – his “aimless journeys” Mr. Stanley has called them, but undertaken nevertheless by order of Ward’s superior officer, Major Barttelot.

Whether or not the Arabs of the camp or the Manyuemas had a share in the tragedy on the other side of the river is a question perhaps of no serious moment; but confessions were made to Ward which rather tend to show that the Arabs, while waiting for the expected advance, fulfilled other engagements on the river. “I went to Selim’s camp to-day,” writes Mr. Ward in one of his private letters, “and they told me that two more of their men (Arabs) had been caught and eaten by the natives whose village they had raided and burnt some weeks ago.” The same correspondent again writes: “This morning some of the raiders came down from up-river with news of the defeat of ten of their number, cut to pieces by the natives, who sought refuge in their canoes above the rapids.” Selim and his men started off in pursuit, and returned at night lamenting that they had killed only two of the natives. On the next day he told Ward that where his men had fallen he found their fingers tied in strings to the scrub of the river-bank, and some cooking-pots containing portions of their bones. What a weary time it was waiting, and with only this kind of incident to ruffle the monotony of it – waiting for the promised carriers that did not come – waiting for news of Stanley that only came in suggestions of disaster! It is hardly a matter of surprise that the camp began to fear the worst. Their own experiences of the broken word of Tippoo Tib and the utter unreliability and ferocity of a portion of their force might well give a pessimistic tone to their contemplation of the awful possibilities of Stanley’s march. Every omen of the Aruwimi was unfavorable to success; and they must have been terribly impressed by such a scene as that which cast its murderous light upon the river not long previously to the forward march, with the assassination of the commander and the eventual dispersion of the rear-guard.

The above refers to Stanley’s Emin Pasha expedition, details of which are given further on. But it is introduced here as showing what he had to contend with every time he struck the confluence of the two great rivers, and how difficult it was for him to pursue any other policy than he did, as it is a bewildering spot in nature, and in its human forces, so it is in its diplomancy.

One of the writers above mentioned goes on to discuss the question of cannibalism whose existence on the Upper Congo, and in other parts of Africa, has been asserted by correspondents. He says his own description of these practices on the Aruwimi and the Congo are in no way connected with the reports which are criticised in Mr. Stanley’s letter from Msalala, on Lake Victoria, in August 1889. Mr. Ward in none of his letters has ever mentioned or suggested that the Manyuemas were cannibals, or in any way justified the extraordinary statement of the Rev. William Brooke in the Times to the effect that it was common in the Manyuema camp to see “human hands and feet sticking out of cooking-pots.” This is evidently a canard. Perhaps it would be well for Mr. Brooke to give his authorities, since Mr. Stanley asks who they are that have seen these extraordinary sights. The Manyuemas are a fierce race; but, personally, Mr. Stanley has found them loyal and true to his service, and they are not cannibals, so far as I can learn. The instances of cannibalism mentioned in letters from the Aruwimi camp refer to the natives of the district outside the camp, and against whom the camp was fortified. But if Mr. Brooke has been misled, so also has Mr. Stanley in regard to the report he seems to have found in his bundles of newspaper cuttings to the effect that an execution of a woman was delayed by Jameson or Barttelot in order that a photographer might make ready his apparatus for taking a negative of the incident. This gruesome anecdote does not belong to Africa at all; it comes from a different part of the world altogether; was discussed in Parliament as an allegation made against an English Consul; and turned out to be either untrue or a gross exaggeration. When Mr. Stanley has learnt all that was said and conjectured about his doings in the long intervals of the silence and mystery that enshrouded him he will find less and less material for serious criticism in the other packets of press extracts he may yet have to unfold: but he need hardly be told that those who knew him and those who have trusted him would not, whatever happened, be led into thinking for a moment that he would break his promise or neglect his duty.

Stanley’s upward bound steamers now pass several devastated districts which in 1877 were peopled by ferocious beings ready with their canoes to sweep down upon his descending flotilla. At length the island tribe of the Wenya is reached. These are expert fishermen, and had been left unharmed by the Arabs, – and for policy sake too, since their acquaintance with Stanley Falls had been turned to practical account. Their knowledge of the intricate channels had enabled them to pilot the Arab canoes down over the obstructions and return them in the same way, the owners making the portage afoot.

Here the steamers were at the foot of Stanley Falls. These Falls consist of seven distinct cataracts extending over a distance of fifty-six miles. The lower or seventh cataract is simply a rough interruption to navigation for a distance of two miles. Above this is a navigable stretch of twenty-six miles, when the sixth cataract is reached. This, on the left side, is an impassable fall, but on the right is a succession of rapids. From the sixth to the fifth cataract is a twenty-two mile stretch of navigable water. The fifth, fourth, third, second and first cataracts come in quick succession, and within a space of nine miles. They appear to be impassable, but the fact that the natives manage to pass the Arab canoes up and down them proves that there are channels which are open to light craft when dexterously handled.

The width of the Congo at the seventh cataract is 1330 yards, divided into several broken channels by islands and rocks. The inhabitants of the islands above and below are skillful fishermen belonging to two or three different tribes. They obstruct even the swiftest channels with poles from which are appended nets for catching fish and these are visited daily in their canoes, over waters of clashing swiftness and ever threatening peril. Portions of their catch they use for food, the rest is converted into smoked food with which they buy women and children slaves, canoes and weapons. They are impregnably situated as to enemies. Their villages are scenes of industry. Long lines of fish-curers may be seen spreading fish on the platforms; old men weave nets and sieves; able-bodied men are basket makers and implement makers of various fantastic designs; the women prepare meal and bread, etc., or make crockery; the watermen are skillful canoe builders.

This was the spot upon which Stanley desired to erect a trading station and these were the people with whom he was to negotiate for a possession. He had no fears of the result, for it was evident that the Arabs and the half-castes of Nyangwe, beyond, would find advantage in a station at which they could obtain cloth, guns, knives and all articles of European manufacture at a much cheaper rate than from the Eastern coast. A palaver was opened with the assembled chiefs, in which Stanley was formally received and stated his object. Receptions by African chiefs are always very formal. Altogether, they are not uninteresting. Livingstone mentions one with King Chitapangwa, in which he was ushered into an enormous hut where the dignitary sat before three drummers and ten more men with rattles in their hands. The drummers beat fearfully on their drums, and the rattlers kept time, two of them advancing and retreating in a stooping posture, with their rattles near the ground, as if doing the chief obeisance, but still keeping time with the others. After a debate of three days duration the chiefs came to terms and ceded sovereignty over the islands and adjacent shores, with the right to build and trade. The large island of Wané Rusari was selected as the site of the station and a clearing was made for building. The question of a supply of vegetable food was settled by Siwa-Siwa, an inland chief, who promised to make the garrison his children and guaranteed them plenty of garden products. Binnie, engineer of the Royal, a plucky little Scotchman of diminutive stature, was appointed chief of the new Stanley Falls Station, and left in full authority. The boat’s crews cleared four acres of ground for him, and furnished him with axes, hoes, hammers, nails, flour, meats, coffee, tea, sugar, cloths, rods, beads, mugs, pans, and all the etceteras of a mid-African equipment. He was given thirty one armed men and plenty of ammunition. Then with full instructions as to his duty he was left to the care of Providence.

On December 10th the steamers began their return journey, having reached the full geographic limit marked out by the Brussels Committee. The return was to be signalized by obtaining the protectorship of the districts intervening between the stations thus far established on the Congo, so that the authority of the new State should be unbroken from Vivi to Stanley Falls. But this work, on second thought, could well be left to others with more time at their disposal than had Stanley. Therefore the steamers, taking advantage of the current, and bearing ten selected men of the native tribes about Stanley Falls, each in possession of three ivory tusks, made a speedy downward trip.