is 4000 yards wide. All the villages were represented
on the occasion by the chiefs in person, accompanied
by a few hundreds of people, who honour me without
many weapons.
To them there was not much likeness of a gun
about the Krupp. “ If it were a gun, where was the
trigger, stock, ramrod? And what, in th’e name of
goodness, were the wheels for ?
“ Tut,” they said; “ Bula Matari is joking. I t cannot
be a g u n ; it bears no resemblance to a gun. It
looks like a fine piece of wood with a deep hole m its
beHy.”
I t was, therefore, decidedly necessary to fire the
Krupp. They were turbulent through their unsophisticated
wildness. They knew no better. A brass rod
causes a w a r; a drop too much of beer .ends in a war.
I f they have a bad dream, some unfortunate is accused,
and burnt for witchcraft, or hung for being an accessory
to it. A chief dies from illness, and from two to fifty
people are butchered over his grave. When the chief
of Moye—'the next village, above our station died,
forty-five people were slaughtered, and only a short
time before Ibaka strangled a lovely young girl because
her lover had sickened and died. Two slaves of Ibaka
quarrelled over their beer, and one shot the other; the
brother of the murdered man demanded twelve slaves,
two bales of cloth, and 1500 brass rods; one of the male
slaves was beheaded, and a female slave was strangled,
that their spirits might accompany the spirit of the
dead slave on its dreary journey to the unknown
universe. That we had not been more involved in i883.
Sept. 14 trouble with such people as these of Bolobo has been Boiobo.
solely due to our anxious care and large forbearance.
Notwithstanding their professions of incredulity as
to its power, it was observed that the chiefs took great
care to keep at a respectful distance from the Krupp,
and, when finally the artillerist, after sighting the piece
to 2000 yards, fired it, and the cannon spasmodically
[ recoiled, their bodies also instantaneously developed a
[ convulsive movement, after which they sat stupidly
gazing at one another. A second shot was fired to
13000 yards, and the appearance of the column of water
I heaved by it, satisfied the most sceptical that the
I implement was a gun of immense power.
But the following little episode will well illustrate
■the character of the Wy-yanzi. After the peaceful
■exhibition of the powers, of the Krupp, I seized the
■occasion to explain to them how very foolish they were
Ito fight their friends. No white man had yet injured
■any of them. We had settled at Bolobo only at the
solicitation of Ibaka, and all the chiefs had tasted of
■the white man’s liberality. I now would pay for the
■seer to celebrate a long peace, and I according delivered
■to each man one piece of cloth and ten brass rods, which,
Ifis there were fifteen chiefs and elders, amounted to
■nore than the fine exacted from Lower Bolobo for
«looting without provocation at our steamers.
| They left the goods on the ground, and went
» side to consider or hold a palaver, and after all had
»m v e d at an agreement they came back to their seats,