HUNTING AND HUNTED IN BELGIAN CONGO 



the same tune again, accompanied by a nasal chant, 

 similar to that of the Malays, and I had great difficulty 

 in ridding myself of him. 



Summoning the carriers to get on the road again, we 

 moved on to a suitable camp site that I had espied on the 

 slope about a mile ahead of us. All the musicians of the 

 country seemed to be with us, for not less than thirty 

 people, ferocious looking folk most of them, marched 

 just ahead of me twanging strings, blowing on reeds, 

 clapping hands, singing, shouting, and dancing madly. 

 Little children ran away into the grass crying out as we 

 passed by, dogs of every description barked and ran 

 around me with their dry tongues hanging limply out of 

 their mouths as great clouds of dust rose up from the 

 path. Behind the procession came the more timid 

 members of the populace, and women lifted children 

 shoulder high in order to let them see the newcomer. 

 Those ahead, who accompanied their music with shuffling 

 feet and peculiar rhythmic motions of the body, cared 

 nothing about the choking clouds of dust they were 

 raising, and the peculiar odours emanating from their 

 perspiring persons were very unpleasant. Ahead of all 

 there marched one fellow carrying an old single-barrel 

 muzzle-loader of enormous bore, evidently a relic of the 

 old days of Emin Pasha's regime near Wadelai. The 

 barrel was polished up so brightly that one could see 

 one's face in it ! The barrel had long since come apart 

 from the stock, and in place of the metal bands that once 

 held them together, a few pieces of grass cord were tied 

 round, half the shoulder piece had been broken off and 

 the sights had gone altogether. The owner carried it in 

 true military style on the left shoulder at the slope. 

 A conical grass hat like the top of a Chinese Pagoda was 

 on his head, his body was adorned with the remains of an 

 old blue Belgian Askari jersey, on which there was worked 

 a huge yellow star, and the garment was worn back to 



70 



