When I left Elizabethville I bade farewell to the comforts of life. I mean, for example, such things as ice, bath-tubs, and running water. There is enough water in the Congo to satisfy the most ardent teetotaler but unfortunately it does not come out of faucets. Most of it flows in rivers, but very little of it gets inside the population, white or otherwise.

Speaking of water brings to mind one of the useful results of such a trip as mine. Isolation in the African wilds gives you a new appreciation of what in civilization is regarded as the commonplace things. Take the simple matter of a hair-cut. There are only two barbers in the whole Congo. One is at Elizabethville and the other at Kinshassa, on the Lower Congo, nearly two thousand miles away. My locks were not shorn for seven weeks. I had to do what little trimming there was done with a safety razor and it involved quite an acrobatic feat. Take shaving. The water in most of the Congo rivers is dirty and full of germs. More than once I lathered my face with mineral water out of a bottle. The Congo River proper is a muddy brown. For washing purposes it must be treated with a few tablets of permanganate of potassium which colours it red. It is like bathing in blood.

Since my journey from Katanga onward was through the heart of Africa, perhaps it may be worth while to tell briefly of the equipment required for such an expedition. Although I travelled for the most part in the greatest comfort that the Colony afforded, it was necessary to prepare for any emergency. In the Congo you must be self-sufficient and absolutely independent of the country. This means that you carry your own bed and bedding (usually a folding camp-bed), bath-tub, food, medicine-chest, and cooking utensils.

No detail was more essential than the mosquito net under which I slept every night for nearly four months. Insects are the bane of Africa. The mosquito carries malaria, and the tsetse fly is the harbinger of that most terrible of diseases, sleeping sickness. Judging from personal experience nearly every conceivable kind of biting bug infests the Congo. One of the most tenacious and troublesome of the little visitors is the jigger, which has an uncomfortable habit of seeking a soft spot under the toe-nail. Once lodged it is extremely difficult to get him out. These pests are mainly found in sandy soil and give the Negroes who walk about barefooted unending trouble.

No less destructive is the dazzling sun. Five minutes exposure to it without a helmet means a prostration and twenty minutes spells death. Stanley called the country so inseparably associated with his name "Fatal Africa," but he did not mean the death that lay in the murderous black hand. He had in mind the thousand and one dangers that beset the stranger who does not observe the strictest rules of health and diet. From the moment of arrival the body undergoes an entirely new experience. Men succumb because they foolishly think they can continue the habits of civilization. Alcohol is the curse of all the hot countries. The wise man never takes a drink until the sun sets and then, if he continues to be wise, he imbibes only in moderation. The morning "peg" and the lunch-time cocktail have undermined more health in the tropics than all the flies and mosquitoes combined.

The Duke of Wellington recommended a formula for India which may well be applied to the Congo. The doughty old warrior once said:

If a man will practice moderation in all things, take five grains of quinine every day, exercise whenever it is possible, and keep his body clean, he has little to fear from the ordinary diseases of a country like the Congo. It is one of the ironies of civilization that after passing unscathed through all the fever country, I caught a cold the moment I got back to steam-heat and all the comforts of home.

No one would think of using ordinary luggage in the Congo. Everything must be packed and conveyed in metal boxes similar to the uniform cases used by British officers in Egypt and India. This is because the white ant is the prize destroyer of property throughout Africa. He cuts through leather and wood with the same ease that a Southern Negro's teeth lacerate watermelon. Leave a pair of shoes on the ground over night and you will find them riddled in the morning. These ants eat away floors and sometimes cause the collapse of houses by wearing away the wooden supports. Another frequent guest is the driver ant, which travels in armies and frequently takes complete possession of a house. It destroys all the vermin but the human inmates must beat a retreat while the process goes on.

Since my return many people have asked me what books I read in the Congo. The necessity for them was apparent. I had more than three months of constant travelling, often alone, and for the most part on small river boats where there is no deck space for exercise. Mail arrives irregularly and there were no newspapers. After one or two days the unceasing panorama of tropical forests, native villages, and naked savages becomes monotonous. Even the hippopotami which you see in large numbers, the omnipresent crocodile, and the occasional wild elephant, cease to amuse. You are forced to fall back on that unfailing friend and companion, a good book.

I therefore carried with me the following books in handy volume size:—Montaigne's Essays, Palgrave's Golden Treasury of English Verse, Lockhart's Life of Napoleon, Autobiography of Cellini, Don Quixote, The Three Musketeers, Lorna Doone, Prescott's Conquest of Mexico and The Conquest of Peru, Les Miserables, Vanity Fair, Life and Writings of Benjamin Franklin, Pepys' Diary, Carlyle's French Revolution, The Last of the Mohicans, Westward Ho, Bleak House, The Pickwick Papers, A Tale of Two Cities, and Tolstoi's War and Peace. When these became exhausted I was hard put for reading matter. At a post on the Kasai River the only English book I could find was Arnold Bennett's The Pretty Lady, which had fallen into the hands of an official, who was trying to learn English with it. It certainly gave him a hectic start.

Then, too, there was the eternal servant problem, no less vexing in that land of servants than elsewhere. I had cabled to Horner to engage me two personal servants or "boys" as they are called in Africa. When I got to Elizabethville I found that he had secured two. In addition to Swahili, the main native tongue in those parts, one spoke English and the other French, the official language in the Congo. I did not like the looks of the English-speaking barbarian so I took a chance on Number Two, whose name was Gerome. He was a so-called "educated" native. I was to find from sad experience that his "education" was largely in the direction of indolence and inefficiency. I thought that by having a boy with whom I had to speak French I could improve my command of the language. Later on I realized my mistake because my French is a non-conductor of profanity.

Gerome had a wife. In the Congo, where all wives are bought, the consort constitutes the husband's fortune, being cook, tiller of the ground, beast-of-burden and slave generally. I had no desire to incumber myself with this black Venus, so I made Gerome promise that he would not take her along. I left him behind at Elizabethville, for I proceeded to Fungurume with Horner by automobile. He was to follow by train with my luggage and have the private car, which I had chartered for the journey to Bukama, ready for me on my arrival. When I showed up at Fungurume the first thing I saw was Gerome's wife, with her ample proportions swathed in scarlet calico, sunning herself on the platform of the car. He could not bring himself to cook his own food although willing enough to cook mine.

I paid Gerome forty Belgian francs a month, which, at the rate of exchange then prevailing, was considerably less than three dollars. I also had to give him a weekly allowance of five francs (about thirty cents) for his food. To the American employer of servants these figures will be somewhat illuminating and startling.

One more human interest detail before we move on. In Africa every white man gets a name from the natives. This appellation usually expresses his chief characteristic. The first title fastened on me was "Bwana Cha Cha," which means "The Master Who is Quick." When I first heard this name I thought it was a reflection on my appetite because "Cha Cha" is pronounced "Chew Chew." Subsequently, in the Upper Congo and the Kasai I was called "Mafutta Mingi," which means "Much Fat." I must explain in self-defense that in the Congo I ate much more than usual, first because something in the atmosphere makes you hungry, and second, a good appetite is always an indication of health in the tropics.

Still another name that I bore was "Tala Tala," which means spectacles in practically all the Congo dialects. There are nearly two hundred tribes and each has a distinctive tongue. In many sections that I visited the natives had never seen a pair of tortoise shell glasses such as I wear during the day. The children fled from me shrieking in terror and thinking that I was a sorcerer. Even gifts of food, the one universal passport to the native heart, failed to calm their fears.

The Congo native, let me add, is a queer character. The more I saw of him, the greater became my admiration for King Leopold. In his present state the only rule must be a strong rule. No one would ever think of thanking a native for a service. It would be misunderstood because the black man out there mistakes kindness for weakness. You must be firm but just. Now you can see why explorers, upon emerging from long stays in the jungle, appear to be rude and ill-mannered. It is simply because they had to be harsh and at times unfeeling, and it becomes a habit. Stanley, for example, was often called a boor and a brute when in reality he was merely hiding a fine nature behind the armour necessary to resist native imposition and worse.