480 THE WORLD'S WOITPERS. 



men, women, children, and infants. Though he had appeared 

 for the purpose of studying these people, and making a treaty of 

 friendship with the chief, the villagers seemed to think he had 

 come merely to make a free exhibition of himself as some natural 

 monstrosity. 



Hundreds of people of the most degraded and unpresentable 

 type crowded around the traveler and gazed with open mouths at 

 his wonderful white skin. Turning to an aged savage, whose 

 amazed countenance was pushed close to his face, Stanley said, 

 " My brother, sit you down on this mat, and let us be friendly 

 and sociable,' at the same time thrusting into his wide-open hand 

 a number of beads, the currency of that country. As Stanley 

 looked at his huge, rough hand, he imagined that he could carve 

 a more comely one out of rhinoceros hide. The thick black skin 

 of his face resembled an extravagant mask, and his nose was so 

 flat that Stanley asked him the reason for such a feature. " Ah," 

 said he, with a sly laugh, " it is the fault of my mother, who, 

 when I was young, bound me too tight to her back." 



Descending from the face, which, crude, large-featured, rough- 

 hewn as it was, bore witness to the possession of much sly humor 

 and a kindly disposition, Stanley's eyes fastened on his naked 

 body. Through the ochreous daubs could be detected strange 

 freaks of ' pricking, circles and squares and crosses, while he 

 traced with wonder the many hard lines and puckers created by 

 age, weather, ill-usage, and rude keeping. 



His feet were monstrous abortions, with soles as hard as hoofs, 

 and his legs, as high up as his knees, were plastered with suc- 

 cessive strata of dirt; his loin-cover, or the queer "girding- 

 tackle," need not be described. It was absolutely appalling to 

 good taste, and the most ragged British beggar or Neapolitan 

 lazzarone is sumptuously clothed in comparison to this African 

 " king." The subjects of this mighty monarch wore around their 

 waists tags of monkey-skin, bits of gorilla bone, goat horns, and 

 shells, while around their necks were strung skins of vipers, and 

 other hideous contrivances. 



As they gazed and crowded and jostled one another, they ex- 



