CHAPTER XVI 



A STAMPEDE OF ELEPHANTS 



From the top of a great conical hill, on which a few 

 trees like giant mushrooms stood above the long grass, 

 we could see far away into the Congo towards the Kibali 

 river and up to Aka. Our eyes swept the country all 

 around for miles, on every hand something held our 

 attention riveted, and the powerful Goertz field-glasses 

 revealed huge stretches of country thickly wooded, in 

 the centre of which through a dense sea of foliage there 

 came thin clouds of curling smoke that floated in the air 

 for a few moments and then vanished into space. Loud 

 drum taps and shrill whistles denoted a village by yonder 

 hill. Far to the west, from a large belt of forest-like 

 country, there came the sounds of tapping drums and a 

 chorus of voices wildly chanting as the shuffling feet 

 sent a cloud of dust into the air, which, rising over the 

 tree-tops, reminded one of the approach of a large cloud 

 of locusts at a great distance. 



Along a winding path at the foot of the hill on which 

 we stood, a long line of naked women and children with 

 crude agricultural implements and baskets, laden with 

 the millet and other fruits of the soil from the fields 

 around, tripped lightly by singing softly in their queer 

 euphonious voices. A cloud passing over the sun threw 

 a great shadow over the earth, and for miles we watched 

 it as it travelled over hill and dale swimming over the 

 great stretch of country to the far north. 



To the south-west there stood seven large hills, like 



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