EXPERIENTIA DOCET 253 



General was long and difficult, and I only emerged 

 from the rather awkward situation by assuring him 

 that, whatever my opinion might have been, I should 

 not have been fool enough to write and publish an 

 attack on the administration of a country through 

 which I was just about to travel. One learns only 

 by experience, and the lesson which I learnt from 

 this — and I mean to follow it in future — was never 

 to write letters from strange countries, but to go 

 provided with an abundance of picture-postcards on 

 which nothing may be written. 



There is a regular service of steamers which ply 

 three times a month between Stanleyville and Leo- 

 poldville, or ' Falls ' and ' Leo,' as the two places are 

 more usually called. The voyage upstream is made 

 in from twenty to twenty-eight days, and the voyage 

 down in from twelve to sixteen days, varying with 

 the amount of water in the river. The departure of 

 the boat from Stanleyville is one of the few excite- 

 ments that the people there have, and the whole 

 white population, to the number of about seventy, 

 turns out in parade uniform and wearing medals and 

 orders — nearly every man in the Congo has a deco- 

 ration of some sort or another, and many of them 

 have four or five. 



The steamers are large, shallow-draught stern- 

 wheel boats of about 150 tons, with accommodation 

 for twenty passengers. Except on the newer boats, 

 the cabins are bare, and each man provides his own 

 bed and furniture. There is an open space on the 



