WILD WORK. 75 



pected from superior intellect while still uncivilized), more 

 difficult to manage than the Congos, and highly impatient of 

 control. 



These Africans, Mr. Mitchell says, all belong nominally to 

 some denomination of Christianity : but their lives are more 

 influenced by their belief in Obeah. While the precepts of 

 religion are little regarded, they stand in mortal dread of 

 those who practise this mischievous imposture. Well might 

 the Commissioner say, in 1867, that several years must 

 elapse before the chaos which reigned could be reduced to 

 order. The wonder is^ that in three years so much has been 

 done. It was very difficult, at first, even to find the where- 

 abouts of many of the squatters. The Commissioner had to 

 work by compass through the pathless forest. Getting little 

 orno food but cassava cakes and "guango" of maize, and now 

 and then a little coffee and salt fish, without time to hunt the 

 game which passed him, and continually wet through, he 

 stumbled in suddenly on one squatting after another, to the 

 astonishment of its owner, who could not conceive how he 

 had been found out, and had never before seen a white man 

 alone in the forest. Sometimes he was in considerable danger 

 of a rough reception from people who could not at first 

 understand what they had to gain by getting legal titles, and 

 buying the lands the fruit of which they had enjoyed either 

 for nothing, or for payment of a small annual assessment for 



