248 DOWN THE CONGO TO THE COAST 



wine to him to meet some one who could share 

 a Httle in his interests, but I do not Hke to think 

 of his state of depression after we had gone away. 



A, few miles below Sendwe is Kindu, the starting- 

 point of the railway from the Congo to Tanganyika 

 and the Katanga District. At that time (February, 

 1907) about three miles of the railway were 

 completed, and for about thirty-six miles the track 

 had been cleared and partly constructed. The work 

 was being rapidly hurried on by a staff of about sixty 

 Europeans and an army of between 2,000 and 3,000 

 native labourers, and it was expected that the line 

 would be completed in three years. Notwith- 

 standing the good wages which were being paid 

 — about double what labourers receive for any other 

 kind of employment in the Congo — work on the 

 railway was very unpopular, and desertions were 

 frequent, owing (presumably) to the pernicious 

 system of payment in trade goods, for which the 

 natives had not the slightest desire. It is most 

 earnestly to be hoped that the line will be com- 

 pleted before very long, as it was having the 

 effect of reducing the country to a state of absolute 

 starvation. Sheep and goats, fowls and eggs, rice 

 and flour, had already reached almost prohibitive 

 prices, and there was every prospect of the supply 

 becoming altogether exhausted, for the simple reason 

 that the State has never thought it worth while 

 to teach the people even the elements of stock- 

 rearing and agriculture. In spite of the extraordinary 



