The San Francisco call., 1903-12-06
INSTRUCTIVE JTUDES
BY BYINOIEnA1EN AND
,INSMEN

a
many more OF them did not die.
did not know what to think of many
things, and great was my surprise to
find that my ideas of the new country
were wholly different from the reality.
At q distance the foliage looked the
same as in the temperate zone From
all I had read I had expected to find
great tropical forests, crowded with
palm. cocoanut and banana trees. with
dense underground. Now, the palms
are comparatively scarce in Africa and
the cocoanut and the banana must be
planted like the orange.
And where were the crocodile, snakes
and large animals familiarly associated
in our minds with Africa? 1 saw moth
ing that had a tropical look but parrots.
Once 1 did see a few monkeys which a
native brought in to sell There were
also a few crows with white spots on
them and a few vultures, very lame.
The natives were not ferocious. They
wore the orthodox breech clout and in
looks they were as negroes in Amert-
ca. They all spoke a pigeon English,
Portuguese or French. And why should
they not, seeing they had been used to
the white man for the last 200 years?
All along the western coast the prevail
ing speech is English.
The heat was not oppressive, being
at the seaboard, the air was balmy and
pleasant. And right here under the
equator, where 1 had expected 1t to be
unbearable, 1 suffered less from the
heat than ! have often done in my na-
tive land. 1 was much disappointed to
find things so tame. Look where 1
might. there were no big animals, not
even little snakes. There were not even
active insects to be enthusiastic over.
I had TO keep still and wait for de-
velopments. One might stay on the
coast, as some men have done, for
years without. seeing any of the won
ders of this great country, and these
are generally the men who give infor-
nation and advice. They have made
up in imagination what they lacked in
experience and have helped the world
TO form an erroneous opinion Of Africa
as a modern inferno.
There was one thing I found that I
was not looking for-namely. the fever.
I had not been there three months be-
fore my first attack. 1t was not serious,
but of course, when a man has the first
attack he always imagines he is going
to die He laughs about IL afterward,
but he does not laugh at the time. The
fever is generally caused by biliousness,
and in this country ii would not be
looked upon as serious. but it is gener-
ally serious enough in it's results.
Homesickness and an excited imagi-
nation have much TO do with bringing
1t about At first my fever did not
amount to much, and there were inter
walls of some two weeks between at
taclxs. Then they became more fire.
Quent and at last the fever lasted all
the time Ny temperature was pos
sibly only a fraction Of a degree above
normal in the morning with an increase
Of one or two degrees during the day.
Some days it would run to three or
four degrees above normal. gradually
lost my strength, and in the course Of
three months was nearly a wreck. The
doctors said l must go home. DR..
Guinness was right, then, and all those
years Of planning and preparing were
to be thrown away. / believed i'm
plicity in the Congo State doctor, and
II
die than to return and admit failure.
The English boats came in once a
month. One was almost due. The day
before it came I decided not to be
taken aboard, determining to stay at
all costs. / stayed and got well and
found out that 1 had not been taking
enough quinine. There was nothing
wrong with my constitution, as has
been proven since. For, after learning
how to dive in Africa, 1 never had an
other attack of fever during the whole
of my first trip, although exposed to
the worst hardships.
When 1 recovered from my acclima-
tization I had an offer from a trading
company to go to the Upper Congo. 1
was to take with me some heavy loads
Of a section steamer that had been de-
serted and left behind by the carriers
and construct the boat on the Upper
Congo, above the rapids, on Stanley
Pool. the other part of the boat having
been carried up TO the pool. This work
would take me 300 miles farther into
the interior. 1t was just what / want
ed and had been looking for, so / ac-
cepted and went.
At this stage the Upper Congo was
little known to the civilized world, and
there We're many Of the tributaries of
the Congo with only portion of their
navigable water explored, while the
inland was totally unknown. After
finishing the steamer 1 ran her on her
first trip to Stanley Falls, which was a
place of Importance to the Arabs. Van
Kirchoven was north of the Aruimmi
at the time with a big expedition, and
the Hodister expedition was being or
ganized. Tiputib was on his way to
Zanzibar, having just left the falls; and
Rashid, his nephew, had arrived with
a convoy OF newly raided slaves and
a great quantity of ivory.
Many of the slaves died here on ac-
count Of the failure in crops, and of
smallpox. Some twenty a day were
dying and were pitched into the river.
All the horrors pictured by the other
explorers were enacted here. I made
the acquaintance OF some Of the great
Arab leaders of the Lamont and Ny
angwa, among whom were Tiputib's
brother and son. On my return to
Brazzaville, on Stanley Pool we
learned Of the massacre of Crampen, a
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