NATURE 



26: 



PARKE'S PERSONAL EXPERIENCES IN 

 EQUATORIAL AFRICA. 

 My Personal Experiences in Equatorial Africa as Medi- 

 cal Officer of the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition. By 

 Thomas Heazle Parke, Hon. D.C.L. (Durh.), &c. 

 With Map and numerous Illustrations. (London : 

 Sampson Low, Marston, and Company, Limited, 

 1891.) 

 A FAIRLY large literature lias now seen the light in 

 •^^ which we have had numerous details about the 

 expedition sent out for the relief of Emin Pasha. All of the 

 as yet published volumes treating of this subject have 

 been to a very great extent based only on personal ex- 

 periences, being more or less expanded from notes taken 

 at the time ; it thus happens that of the history of this 

 famous expedition it is difficult to obtain any general 

 survey. As a contribution, however, to such a survey this 

 book of Dr. Parke's is welcome. As the medical officer in 

 charge, the exigencies of the many trying circumstances 

 that arose rendered it necessary that he should attach 

 himself most constantly to the sick camp, and so his 

 narrative comes in to tell us of trials and hardships 

 undergone, of which in Stanley's " Darkest Africa" we 

 of necessity heard but little. 



In order that one may be able to appreciate the facts 

 enumerated in this volume, the reader should bear in 

 mind that the expedition across Africa was in stern 

 reality several expeditions backwards and forwards 

 through the most trying portion of this continent. Under 

 the leadership of Mr. Stanley the officers selected left 

 England late in 1886, but at the last moment the medical 

 officer in charge was compelled to abandon the expedi- 

 tion, and in Cairo, Stanley, who had seen Parke in 

 Alexandria, where the latter was on duty as a member 

 of the British Medical Staff, appointed him as one of his 

 officers. 



Of the journey to Cape Town, and from thence to the 

 mouth of the Congo, little need be said, nor, indeed, are 

 there any special facts of interest about the voyage up 

 the river to Yambuya, where the entrenched camp was 

 formed which was handed over to the care of Barttelot 

 and Jameson. This portion of the journey took four 

 months and a week ; there was of course a certain amount 

 of new experiences, some deaths among the native army, 

 some accidents there were both by land and water, but 

 these are all told within a compass of the first seventy 

 pages. 



From Yambuya the land journey to the Albert Nyanza 

 commenced, Mr. Stanley taking with him Nelson, Stairs, 

 Jephson, and Parke, intending to return for the rear 

 column, which had instructions to make their way slowly 

 onwards in an eastern direction. Tedious was the pro- 

 gress made, paths had to be cut through the bush, one 

 after another of the leaders and many of the men suffered 

 much from fever. There was plenty of game in the forest, 

 judging by the footprints, but already there was some 

 scarcity of provisions. At Avisibba there was an encounter 

 with the natives, when Lieutenant Stairs was shot in the 

 chest by an arrow, from which peril he recovered, though 

 NO. I 160, VOL. 45] 



it was not until long months afterwards that the broken 

 off arrow's head was extracted by Dr. Parke. This part 

 of the journey took four weeks, but after a day's rest at 

 Avisibba the march was again resumed, the next halting 

 stage being at an Arab encampment, marked in the 

 map as Ugarrowa, from the name of the chief. This 

 march was still through the forest, but along the course 

 of the river, and it lasted over four weeks. During it 

 the effect of the cold and wet weather began to tell upon 

 the Zanzibaris ; the constant tramping through the forest 

 was also extremely depressing, malarious marshes and 

 swamps had to be waded through, and even worse, the 

 camps at night had often to be pitched by their very 

 edges. To all these troubles the want of food was added ; 

 of animal food there was almost none. At times hornets 

 and ants came in swarms, and were more dreaded than 

 the arrows of the natives. At Ugarrowa's camp a num- 

 ber of men had to be left, while the rest of the party went 

 on without delay to Ipoto. Within a fortnight after- 

 wards the hardships told so severely on the travellers 

 that when the river navigation came completely to an 

 end at the junction of the Ihuru and the Ituri to form the 

 Aruwimi, itself a large confluent of the Congo River, 

 fifty-two men who were unable to march were left behind 

 with Captain Nelson, himself an invalid. This dreadful 

 spot was afterwards known as Nelson's Starvation Camp. 

 The rest of the party pressed on, and in ten days 

 reached Ipoto, but through all these days there seems to 

 have been but one great struggle to Support life with a 

 minimum quantity of food, men dropt from starvation ; 

 their rifles and loads were then taken by others, and 

 they were left. 



At Ipoto there were three chiefs, head men to Abed 

 Bin Salim, and the people were all Manyuema. Food 

 was to be had — goat flesh, fowls, Indian corn, and beans — 

 and nine days were spent here before the next move lake- 

 wards. Jephson left on October 26, 1887, to return to 

 bring Nelson and all that might be surviving of his men. 

 Mr. Stanley on the following day started for the lake, 

 leaving Parke behind to attend to the sick army that 

 Jephson was to bring up from Nelson's Starvation Camp, 

 and then Jephson was to press on after his chief with all 

 the then available men. Parke now found himself little 

 better than a prisoner in the hands of the Manyuema, 

 with the prospect in store of his troubles being increased 

 by the return of the invalids with Jephson, and the addi- 

 tional horror of knowing that all he obtained from the 

 Manyuema in the way of food could only be paid for by 

 drafts on an uncertain future. On November 3 Jephson 

 came into camp with Nelson, but with only three or four 

 of the band of fifty-two who had been left behind at 

 Starvation Camp. This frightful destruction from starva- 

 tion took place at a spot within, even for feeble men, a 

 three days' journey from their friends at Ipoto. On 

 November 7 Jephson left Ipoto with forty-eight men, 

 leaving Parke and Nelson behind with twenty-four 

 cripples and three boys. For nearly three months long 

 these men had to live through the greatest miseries and 

 privations ; sickness added to semi-starvation made exist- 

 ence almost msupportable, and the reading of this por- 

 tion of Parke's notes is about the most saddening in the 

 book. It is a pity that it should be interrupted by some 

 eighteen pages of a very second-rate account of " bac- 



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