42 SEARCH FOR THE GORILLA AND THE IPL Chap. IIL 



till he dies." This is another of the wild superstitions 

 with which this land is teeming, so fertile are the 

 husy brains of the imaginative Commi people. My 

 guide added that it was the home of a great crocodile 

 whose scales were of brass, and who never left the 

 island. To show the people how vain were their 

 fears, I immediately walked towards the place, and 

 traversed the patch of jungle in various directions. 

 When I came out again the poor negroes seemed 

 stujoified with wonder. They were not cured, how- 

 ever, of their belief, for they only concluded that I 

 was a spirit, and that what would be death to them 

 did no harm to me. 



Early in the morning of the 26th of February, 

 before the drunken king was awake, I started for 

 Nkongon Mboumba, one of his slave villages, there 

 to hunt the ipi or large pangolin, which was said to 

 inhabit the neighbouring forest. During my former 

 journey I sought in vain for the ipi, it being very 

 rarely met with. The place is situated about ten 

 miles south-east of Aniambie, in an undulating well- 

 wooded country. It is built on the summit of a hill, 

 at the foot of which flowed a charming rivulet, which 

 meandered through the valley for some distance, and 

 then became hidden from the view by the dense 

 forest. This district was wholly new ground to me, 

 as I had not visited it in my former travels. Among 

 the slaves residing here to work the king's planta- 

 tions were specimens of no less than eleven different 

 tribes. Some old slaves from the far interior seemed 

 very little removed from the Anthropoid apes in their 

 shape and features — lean legs, heavy bodies with pro- 



