2o8 FROM KIVU TO TANGANYIKA 



turned up their noses (or made an equivalent grimace) 

 at our beautiful blue glass beads, and would have 

 nothing of them. They said they must have red 

 beads — small red beads — or none at all. In other 

 places they wanted small blue beads, or large red 

 beads, and so on. It was the same with the cloth ; 

 one district had a preference for blue cloth, another for 

 white, and another for spotted cloth. There are as 

 many different fashions in beads and cloth in Central 

 Africa as there are in ladies' hats and gowns in more 

 civilized countries. 



At first sight this may seem to be a small matter, 

 but it is, as a matter of fact, the outward and visible 

 expression of one of the most fundamental errors which 

 the Congo Free State has made. By means which 

 I do not profess to understand, the State has suc- 

 ceeded in ousting all private traders from the Congo,* 

 and, except in those districts that are leased to con- 

 cessionary companies, has become the sole trader 

 and the sole employer of labour. Under these cir- 

 cumstances the authorities have, naturally enough, 

 not seen the necessity of going to the expense of 

 establishing a currency which would be universal 

 throughout the country, but they have adhered to 

 the antiquated and doubtless more profitable method 

 of paying for everything in trade goods. In one 



* The only exception to this statement, in the Upper Congo, 

 is Stanleyville, where there were (in igoy) two or three trading 

 firms. In the Lower Congo there are traders at Leopoldville, 

 Matadi, Boma, and Banana. 



