204 LAKE KIVU 



wide. Kwijwe is the largest island on Lake Kivu ; 

 it is about thirty miles long, mountainous, and partly 

 covered with forest. There is a large population, 

 who are at present in the happy position of belonging 

 neither to the Belgians nor the Germans. At one or 

 two of the places where we stopped on the island 

 we were evidently the first white men the natives 

 had seen, and we caused them some alarm ; but they 

 soon overcame their shyness, and were perfectly 

 friendly. 



These people, and the other natives of the Kivu 

 region, still retain the primitive method of obtaining 

 fire from wood. The apparatus is simple enough, 

 and consists of a slender stick of hard wood, a flat 

 piece of soft and partly charred wood (often a seg- 

 ment of a bamboo), and a scrap of inflammable 

 material, such as rag or bark. The slender stick 

 is placed upright upon the soft wood and is rotated 

 very rapidly between the palms of the hands ; the 

 tinder, placed close to the point of contact, smoulders 

 in a few seconds, and can easily be blown into a 

 flame (see illustration, p. 198). Many of them were 

 glad enough to sell their fire-machines for a small 

 box of Swedish matches. In districts where this 

 method of obtaining fire is not employed, the natives 

 have a convenient habit of carrying fire secreted 

 somewhere about their persons. If he is a person 

 who wears a rag of some sort, he probably has a 

 fragment of smouldering wool or fibre tied up in a 

 corner of his garment. If he is very scantily attired, 



