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TO KEEP THE DEVIL OUT.

149

While these ceremonies were going on, I walked to the edge of the village and took a long look, for before me lay once more the ocean and Corisco Bay. I had often on this trip wished myself back here, and it was with no slight feeling of gratitude to God, who had preserved me through all, that I looked once more at the ocean.

TO KEEP THE DEVIL OUT.

150

TROUBLES OF A TRAVELER.

CHAPTER X.

Up the Moondah.-Vexations of a Traveler in Africa.-Mangrove Swamps.Mbicho Men run off.—Bashikouay again.—Missionary Station.-The Bar-wood Trade. Manner of getting Bar-wood.-The India-rubber Vine.-How Rubber is gathered.-Torturing a Woman.-Adventure with a wild Bull.-Lying out for Game.-Bullock and Leopard.-Birds.

It was now near the end of October, and the rainy season had fairly set in. I determined, after some consideration, to make a trip up the Moondah before going to the Gaboon; hoping, indeed, to run up the Moondah and cross the narrow land which separates that stream from the Gaboon, and thus return down the latter to my head-quarters.

My specimens were sent to Corisco. I received a supply of goods which would suffice for buying food up the Moondah; and having settled, after some palaver, with Apourou, who thought the less goods I took with me the better he should be off, I at last got off on the 30th of October.

The process of making ready for such an expedition as this is very tedious, especially if the traveler is at the mercy of the king of a small village. I had to rent my canoe, buy my masts, make my sails, go round through the village and purchase my paddles, and finally I had to engage my men. When all this was done, the goods packed aboard, and good-by said, I had been ten days engaged in preparations. Time is of no value to the Af

rican.

We had a head wind, but nevertheless saw the mouth of the Moondah toward afternoon of our sailing day. The tide was running out, and against us, and, as the wind was still ahead, our progress was slow; but it gave me an opportunity to kill some of the birds which come down here to get their living, on account of the abundance of fish found here. The shore, the mud islands, and the waters all around were alive with these birds. Here a flock of pelicans swam along majestically, keeping at a good distance from our boat; there a long string of flamingoes stretched along the muddy shore, looking, for all the world, like a line

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of fire; and wherever the mud peeped out of the water there were herons, cranes, gulls of various kinds, while a tree on the shore was covered with a flock of the beautiful Egretta flavirostris, whose pure white feathers looked like snow in the distance.

Toward sunset we arrived at the Shekiani village where I intended to stop. The king I had known before, and thought he would help me up farther. This village lay at the top of one of the only two hills I saw on the Moondah, and these are both at its mouth. It is throughout a low-banked, swampy stream, overrun with mangroves, and half dry when the tide runs out. It used to afford a good deal of India-rubber, and the bar-wood trade is always very brisk; also it produces a little beeswax, and a trifle of ebony and ivory. Thus the Shekianis are known to white men, who come there often in their vessels to trade with them. eral thousand tons of bar-wood are taken annually.

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On the 5th of November I started with a new crew up river. I found one vast, continuous mangrove swamp, in which no villages could be found-these lying mostly away from the main stream on little creeks, which, being dry at low tide, could be visited only with difficulty. From these gloomy mangrove forests went up a stench of decaying matter which was not only unhealthy, but unpleasant. Add to this the constant risk of getting our canoe on a mud-bank, and a persistent drizzle with which we were favored all day, and you will see that the day's journey was not pleasant.

Near sunset we came to a Mbicho village. The Mbicho speak a variety of the Shekiani, and we could therefore make ourselves understood. I spent the night here, and found in the morning that my men had run away with the canoe, leaving me, fortunately, my goods, but no means of getting ahead. I had paid them beforehand. I learned that they had had trouble with a village we should have to pass, and did not dare to go higher.

The Mbicho, of course, were delighted to have me at their mercy, and determined, good fellows, to make as much out of me as possible. I began operations by feeing the king-privately, of course who thereupon told his people that I wanted men and a canoe, and that I was his dearest friend. There was much squabling; and, finally, I succeeded in engaging four men to go with me for ten yards of prints each; but not to-day-to-morrow. Tomorrow is the favorite word in Africa.

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Meantime I learned that some white men lived farther up, and knew at once they must be missionaries, whom I determined to see. Accordingly, next morning, we started again—this time in a very small canoe, and with no conveniences of any kind. We were still among mangrove swamps; and it was curious to see that the branches of this tree, which hung in the water at high tide, and were bare at low tide, were covered thickly with oysters.

Between the mud, the smell, and the hot sun, which poured down on my head all day, I got a violent headache, which disappeared only when we came to a sudden and beautiful change of scenery. About forty miles from the mouth of the Moondah the tide ceases to affect the river, and the swamps disappear. As we were sailing along we came to a turn in the river, rounding which we found ourselves in what seemed really another land. The mangroves had entirely disappeared, the banks of the river were higher, and the stream itself rolled along with a life-like current between its well-defined banks. Palms, and the usual vegetation of the African upland, bordered the banks, and here and there large trees projecting over met in the middle, and formed a fine arbor, beneath which we sailed, relieved of the burning rays of the sun.

Presently we came to a small creek, and rowing up that for a mile, I saw before me a narrow path which was to lead me over to the Ikoi Creek, where my friends the missionaries were living.

The Moondah is a most disagreeable and unhealthy river-one vast swamp, which seems little likely ever to be useful to man. I was forced to take quinine twice a day while going up, and the few natives who live near its banks are a poor set, sickly, and with little energy.

Back of the swamp, however, there are hills and a high country, where the bar-wood-tree exists in great abundance. The natives cut great quantities of it every year; and if it did not grow fast and in the greatest plenty they would long since have exhausted it, as well here as on the Muni and the Gaboon.

We traveled along our path till dark, when we fell in with a Bakalai village. The people wanted me to stay, but their motions were suspicious, and I would not. We got torches, and I sent a man ahead and kept one behind, to light us on our way. In this village I saw an Albino, his face quite white, and his hair flaxen a very singular sight.

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