The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1890-06-18
IVORY-RAIDING,
Compared with it Stanley Says that Slave
Trading becomes Innocence.

Mr.. Stanley, in his long letter to
Col Euan-Smith, recently published in
England as parliament paper, gives
narrowing account of the doings OF
the ivory-raiders in Africa. He says:
'sTwenty-eight days march from
Fort Bodo brought US once more to
Ugarrowwa's station. But it was now
abandoned; the slave-trader and his
hundreds of desperadoes had COM
menced the return home with 500 tusks
of ivory, which had been collected after
| immense waste of life and native prop
erty.
People in England have not the
slightest idea what the present fashion
of ivory-collecting, as adopted by the
Arabs and Zanzibari half-castes west of
the lake regions, means. Slave-trad-
ing becomes innocence when compared
with ivory-raiding. The latter has be-
come literally a most bloody business.
Bands consisting of from 800 to 600
Mayema, armed with Enfield carbines
and officered by Zanzibar Arabs and
Swahili, range over that immense forest
land east of the Upper Congo, destroy
ing every district they discover and
driving such natives as escape the sud-
| den fusillades into the deepest recesses
| of the forest. In the midst of a vast
circle described by several days march
| in every direction the ivory-raiders
select locality wherein plantations
are abundant prepare few acres for
rice, and while the crop is growing
sally out by twenties or torties to de-
stroy every village within the circle
and to hunt up the miserable natives
who have escaped their first secret and
sudden onslaughts.
They are aware that the forest,
though it furnishes recesses of bush
F., impervious to discovery, is q hungry
wilderness outside the plantation grove
of the clearing, and that to sustain life
the women must forage far and near
for berries. wild fruit, and fungi.
These scattered bands of ivory-hunters
| find these women and children an easy
prey. The startling explosion of
| heavily loaded guns in the deep woods
paralyzes the timid creatures, and be-
| fore they recover from their deadly
| fright are rushed upon and secured.
By the possession of these captives they
| impose upon the tribal communities the
necessity of surrendering every article
of value. ivory, or goats, to gain the
| liberty of their relatives. Thus the
land becomes thoroughly denuded of
ivory, but unfortunately, also, it be-
comes wild waste.
THE 600 ivory tusks that Ugar-
rowwa was bearing now to the coast
had been acquired by just such bloody
work, relentless destruction of human
life, and condemnation of the happy
survivors of the tribal communities to
indescribable miscries. What Ugar-
rowwa had done within his elected cir
Gle Kilonga-Longa has performed with
no less skill, but certainly with 81
far greater disregard to the interests of
humanity within his reserve, and the
same cruel, murderous policy was be-
ing pursued with dozens of other cir
cles into which the region as far south
as Urregga, north to the WelIe, east to
longitude 90 degrees and 80 minutes,
and west to the Congo was parceled
out. In the early parts of the month
of August the column overlook the
immense caravan of Ugarrowwa, his
dotilla of fifty-seven canoes laden with
helpless children, girls and young
women, and his hoard of ivory, equal
to about fifteen tons, was at the land
ing-place of a village near Wasp
Rapids, on the Ituri river.