246 DOWN THE CONGO TO THE COAST 



a little higher up than Kasongo to the head of 

 Stanley Falls, a distance of more than 400 miles. 

 We stopped for a few days at Kamimbi, as it looked 

 a promising place for birds and butterflies, and 

 we were the guests of the Chef de Paste, Lieutenant 

 de Rossi, who had a wonderful faculty of taming the 

 birds and beasts with which his house was filled. 

 The latest addition to his menagerie was a young 

 half-grown chimpanzee, which had taken an extra- 

 ordinary affection for him, and would hardly let him 

 go out of its sight. It used to sit on a chair at 

 the dinner-table and drink its soup with a spoon 

 in the most ludicrously grown-up manner. If it 

 behaved badly, a message would be sent for the 

 sentry and a whip, and at the mention of the word 

 ' fimbo ' (whip) Joseph would scream with rage or 

 terror, and fling his arms round his master's neck. 

 If he woke up during the night, the only way to stop 

 his crying was to put him in Lieutenant De Rossi's 

 arms until he fell asleep, and then a boy would carry 

 him off to bed again. It was a horrible exhibition, 

 and a painful caricature of humanity, and I was 

 not at all sorry when we no longer dined with 

 Joseph. 



We also spent a few days at Sendwe, a place 

 at the lower end of the Kamimbi Rapids, where the 

 Congo Government has established an experimental 

 botanical station. The undergrowth in the forest 

 had been cut down, and in long narrow strips, 

 where the ground had been cleared to the bare 



