The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1889-07-17
A G0RILLA'S BRIDE.
THE QUEER AMATORY EXPERI-
ENCE OF A LADY OF THE
CONGO REGION.

The Great Brute Was Very Kind to
Her London Dinner Nuisnnces -
Laughter a Key to Character-Ellen
Terry and Victoria.
From the Indianapolis Netcs.
'"The natives of Africa are towards
in war;" said Carl Steckman, who
started today for New York, prepare
tory to going to the Congo region.
''They prefer to take prisoners, and
comparatively few of their enemies
are killed outright. They are afraid
to strike for fear they will receive a
more damaging blow in return. They
make slaves of their prisoners, and the
captives have a sorry time.
"Of all enemies they dread the go
rilla most. And he is a foe that no
man dares despise. He will fight at
sight. Numbers do not deter him.
He is so human and so desperate in
his defence and attack that the Afri-
cans have long learned that to fight
with a gorilla is to fight to the death.
This dreadful animal keeps to the
woods, as it is necessary to grasp hold
of the boughs as he walks on his hind
legs. A mar is therefore compare
lively safe if he is OF the prairie.
'"There are some extraordinary
things told of the gorilla. l will re-
late one of them. l had always heard
it said that the male gorilla would not
harm a woman. This is the common
belief of some tribes. One day we
came to q village in which N hut
had been built apart from the rest.
We inquired for the reason of this
and found that it had been dedicated
to a witch. This witch was greatly
revered. She had been the wife of a
gorilla. The woman had lived in the
village in a house which stood on the
edge of the forest. A great tree over
hung her shanty. In the village all
the trees had been cut down as a pre-
caution against the gorillas. One
night one of these animals came out
of the forest, got up into the big tree
which overhung the woman's house,
climbed down on to the root, threw
the roof off, swung down into the hut,
seized the woman, climbedup through
the hole in the roof up into the tree
and went away into the woods, carry
ing the woman with him. His
great strength made this an easy
thing for him to do. He could hold
her in one arm and with his two hind
legs and his one free forearm make his
way up and down trees II through the
woods. The people saw that her
house roof had been torn off. They
looked carefully around the house and
saw that there were no tracks what
ever. They then knew that
the dread enemy had carried
her off. One day she came back.
She told a wonderful story.
The gorilla had carried her for miles
into the woods and finally had
climbed a great tree and deposited
her in his home. There he treated
her very kindly, brought her food and
drink, but would not permit
her to leave. After watching her
carefully for many days he finally
left her, probably intending to
in a short time, convinced
that she would remain. The woman
came down to the ground, and after
wandering in the forest for several
days made her way back to the viii
lage. The people at first were about
to kill her, but they finally concluded
that she was possessed of extraordin-
airy powers. They, therefore. built her
a house for herself, supplied her with
every comfort and looked up to her as
a sacred person.