THE CONGO FREE STATE 271 



certain rude justice, often harsh enough, no doubt, 

 and it is justice they want rather than laws. 



Though I have searched diligently through most 

 of the recently published accounts of the Congo and 

 its administration, I have failed to find a single 

 recorded instance of actual ill-treatment of natives 

 witnessed by an European, and I believe that no 

 one has seen anything more serious than that which 

 I have seen myself, as set forth in the preceding 

 pages. This is not to say that instances of injustice 

 and * atrocities ' (if the word be insisted on) have 

 not occurred. It is a truism that there is never any 

 smoke without fire, but a very small smoulder often 

 produces a vast volume of smoke. 



There is a Boer maxim, which applies as well in 

 Central Africa as in the South — ' In Africa believe 

 nothing that you hear and only half that you see.' 

 There must be some subtle influence in the climate, 

 which affects the minds of Europeans in Africa, so 

 that their imaginations sometimes play strange tricks 

 with them ; but no more of them, for fear of causing 

 offence. It would be an injustice to the natives of 

 Central Africa to say that you can never believe a 

 word they say, but they have a disconcerting habit, 

 which is not altogether unknown amongst more 

 civilized races, of answering a question in the way 

 that they think you would like best, and it is not 

 easy to get at the actual truth. 



As an instance of the difficulty of finding out the 

 true circumstances of a story, I will mention a case 



