Two stops on the Congo River deserve special attention. In the Congo there began in 1911 an industry that will have an important bearing on the economic development of the Colony. It was the installation of the first plant of the Huileries du Congo Belge. This Company, which is an offshoot of the many Lever enterprises of England, resulted from the growing need of palm oil as a substitute for animal fat in soap-making. Lord Leverhulme, who was then Sir William Lever, obtained a concession for considerably more than a million acres of palm forests in the Congo. He began to open up so-called areas and install mills for boiling the fruit and drying the kernels. He now has eight areas, and two of them, Elizabetha and Alberta,—I visited both—are on the Congo River.

For hundreds of years the natives have gathered the palm fruit and extracted the oil. Under their method of manufacture the waste was enormous. The blacks threw away the kernel because they were unaware of the valuable substance inside. Lord Leverhulme was the first to organize the industry on a big and scientific basis and it has justified his confidence and expenditure.

Most people are familiar with the date and the cocoa-nut palms. From the days of the Bible they have figured in narrative and picture. The oil palm, on the other hand, is less known but much more valuable. It is the staff of life in the Congo and for that matter, practically all West Africa. Thousands of years ago its sap was used by the Egyptians for embalming the bodies of their kingly dead. Today it not only represents the most important agricultural industry of the Colony, having long since surpassed rubber as the premier product, but it has an almost bewildering variety of uses. It is food, drink and shelter. Out of the trunk the native extracts his wine; from the fruit, and this includes the kernel, are obtained oil for soap, salad dressing and margarine; the leaves provide a roof for the native houses; the fibre is made into mats, baskets or strings for fishing nets, while the wood goes into construction. Even the bugs that live on it are food for men.

The "H. C. B." as the Huileries du Congo Belge is more commonly known in the Congo, really performed a courageous act in exploitation when it set up shop in the remote regions and devoted itself to an absolutely fresh enterprise, so far as extensive development is concerned, at a time when the rich and profitable products of the country were rubber, ivory and copal. The company's initiative, therefore, instigated the trade in oleaginous products which is so conspicuous in the economic life of the country.

The installation at Alberta, while not so large as the Leverville area on the Kwilu River, will serve to show just what the corporation is doing. Five years ago this region was the jungle. Today it is the model settlement on the Congo River. The big brick office building stands on a brow of the hill overlooking the water. Not far away is the large mill where the palm fruit is reduced to oil and the kernels dried. Stretching away from the river is a long avenue of palms, flanked by the commodious brick bungalows of the white employes. The "H. C. B." maintains a store at each of its areas, where food and supplies are bought by the personnel. These stores are all operated by the SociÉtÉ d'Entreprises Commerciales au Congo Belge, known locally under the name of "Sedec," formed as its name indicated, with a view of benefiting by the great resources opened to commerce in the Colony.

For miles in every direction the Company has laid out extensive palm plantations. In the Alberta region twenty-five hundred acres are in course of cultivation in what is known as the Eastern Development, while sixteen hundred more acres are embodied in the Western development. An oil palm will bear fruit within seven years after the young tree is planted. The fruit comes in what is called a rÉgime, which resembles a huge bunch of grapes. It is a thick cluster of palm fruit. Each fruit is about the size of a large date. The outer portion, the pericarp, is almost entirely yellow oil encased in a thick skin. Imbedded in this oil is the kernel, which contains an even finer oil. The fruit is boiled down and the kernel, after a drying process, is exported in bags to England, where it is broken open and the contents used for salad oil or margarine.

Before the war thousands of tons of palm oil and kernels were shipped from the West Coast of Africa to Germany every year. Now they are diverted to England where large kernel-crushing plants have been installed and the whole activity has become a British enterprise. With the eclipse of the German Colonial Empire in Africa it is not likely that she can regain this lost business.

The creation of new palmeries is merely one phase of the company's development. One of its largest tasks is to safeguard the immense natural palmeries on its concessions. The oil palm requires constant attention. The undergrowth spreads rapidly and if it is not removed is liable to impair the life of the tree. Thousands of natives are employed on this work. A large knife something like the Cuban machete is used.

Harvesting the rÉgimes is a spectacular performance not without its element of danger. The rÉgime grows at the top of the tree, usually a height of sixty or seventy-five feet and sometimes more. The native literally walks up the trunk with the help of a loop made from some stout vine which encircles him. Arriving at the top he fixes his feet against the trunk, leans against the loop which holds him fast, and hacks away at the rÉgime. It falls with a heavy thud and woe betide the human being or the animal it strikes. The natives will not cut fruit in rainy weather because many have slipped on the wet bark and fallen to their death.

So wide is the Alberta fruit-producing area that a narrow-gauge railway is necessary to bring the fruit in to the mill. Along its line are various stations where the fruit is mobilized, stripped from the rÉgime and sent down for refining in baskets. Each station has a superintendent who lives on the spot. The personnel of all the staff in the Congo is almost equally divided between British and Belgians.

While the "H. C. B." is the largest factor in the palm oil industry in the Congo, many tons of kernels are gathered every year by individuals who include thousands of natives. One reason why the savage takes naturally to this occupation is that it demands little work. All that he is required to do is to climb a tree in the jungle and lop off a rÉgime. He uses the palm oil for his own needs or disposes of it to a member of his tribe and sells the kernels to the white man.

The "H. C. B." is independent of all other water transport in the Congo. Its river tonnage aggregates more than 6,000, and in addition it has many oil barges on the various rivers where its vessels ply. The capacity of some of the barges is 250 tons of oil. They are usually lashed to the side of the steamer. The decks of these barges are often piled high with bags of kernels and become a favorite sleeping place for the black voyagers for whom the thousands of insects that lurk in them have no terrors. No bug inflicts a sharper sting than these pests who make their habitat among the palm kernels.

One of my fellow passengers on the "Comte de Flandre" was I. F. Braham, the Associate Managing Director of the "H. C. B." in the Congo. Long the friend and companion in Liberia of Sir Harry Johnston, he was a most desirable and congenial companion. It was on his suggestion and invitation that I spent the week at Alberta and he shared the visit. Our hosts were Major and Mrs. Claude Wallace.

Major Wallace was the District Manager of the Alberta area and occupied a brick bungalow on the bank of the river. He is a pioneer in exploration in the French Congo and Liberia and went almost straight from the battlefields of France, where he served with distinction in the World War, out to his post in the Congo. His wife is a fine example of the white woman who has braved the dangers of the tropics. She left the luxury and convenience of European life to establish a home in the jungle.

It is easy to spot the refining influence of the woman in the African habitation. You always see the effect long before you behold the cause. One of these effects is usually a neat garden. Mrs. Wallace had half an acre of English roses in front of her house. They were the only ones I saw in Central Africa. The average bachelor in this part of the world is not particularly scrupulous about the appearance of his house. The moment you observe curtains at the window you know that there is a female on the premises.

My life at Alberta was one of the really delightful experiences in the Congo. Every morning I set out with Braham and Wallace on some tour of inspection. Often we rode part of the way on the little light railroad. The method of transport was unique. An ordinary bench is placed on a small flat car. The propelling power is furnished by two husky natives who stand on either side of the bench and literally shove the vehicle along with long sticks. It is like paddling a railroad canoe. This transportation freak is technically called a maculla. The strong-armed paddlers were able to develop an astonishing speed. I think that this is the only muscle-power railroad in the world. Light engines are employed for hauling the palm fruit trains.

After our day in the field—for frequently we took our lunch with us—we returned before sunset and bathed and dressed for dinner. In the Congo only a madman would take a cold plunge. The most healthful immersion is in tepid water. More than one Englishman has paid the penalty with his life, by continuing his traditional cold bath in the tropics. This reminds me of a significant fact in connection with colonization. Everyone must admit that the Briton is the best colonizer in the world. One reason is that he knows how to rule the man of colour for he does it with fairness and firmness. Another lies in the fact that he not only keeps himself clean but he makes his environment sanitary.

There is a tradition that the Constitution follows the flag. I contend that with the Englishman the bath-tub precedes the code of law and what is more important, it is in daily use. There are a good many bath-tubs in the Congo but they are employed principally as receptacles for food supplies and soiled linen.

Those evenings at Alberta were as unforgettable as their setting. Braham and Wallace were not only men of the world but they had read extensively and had travelled much. A wide range of subjects came under discussion at that hospitable table whose spotless linen and soft shaded lights were more reminiscent of London and New York than suggestive of a far-away post on the Congo River on the edge of the wilderness.

At Alberta as elsewhere, the "H. C. B." is a moral force. Each area has a doctor and a hospital. No detail of its medical work is more vital to the productive life of the Colony that the inoculation of the natives against sleeping sickness. This dread disease is the scourge of the Congo and every year takes toll of hundreds of thousands of natives. Nor is the white man immune. I saw a Belgian official dying of this loathsome malady in a hospital at Matadi and I shall never forget his ravings. The last stage of the illness is always a period when the victim becomes demented. The greatest boon that could possibly be held out for Central Africa today would be the prevention of sleeping sickness.

Another constructive work carried out under the auspices of the "H. C. B." is embodied in the native schools. There is an excellent one at Alberta. It is conducted by the Catholic Fathers of the Scheut Mission. The children are trained to become wood-workers, machinists, painters, and carpenters. It is the Booker Washington idea transplanted in the jungle. The Scheut Missionaries and their Jesuit colleagues are doing an admirable service throughout the Congo. Some of them are infused with the spirit that animated Father Damien. Time, distance, and isolation count for naught with them. It is no uncommon thing to encounter in the bush a Catholic priest who has been on continuous service there for fifteen or twenty years without a holiday. At Luluaburg lives a Mother Superior who has been in the field for a quarter of a century without wandering more than two hundred miles from her field of operations.