344 FEOM THE NIGER TO THE NILE 



Lopez spent a year in the rubber region, and for the greater 

 part of that time were in out-of-the-way districts, hving side 

 by side with the natives ; but though we spoke with 

 the chief of every village we came to, we could not hear 

 of a single case of " atrocities " ; and Gosling, who spent 

 the last six months of his life under similar conditions, 

 found his experience agree with ours. And this did not 

 merely go to prove the absence of oppression, but also to 

 show that the Congo tribes as a whole are happier since the 

 Belgian occupation. I say " as a whole " advisedly, for I 

 must, in all fairness, admit that there are some tribes that 

 feel the oppression of being made to work, and the mihtary 

 restraint that keeps them from eating up other tribes. But 

 in the eyes of the interested humanitarian this misfortune 

 should be outweighed by the advantages conferred on the 

 more gentle natives who now have peace and prosper. 



There is no smoke without fire, and I do not doubt for 

 one moment that in the first days of the colony there were 

 many terrible abuses. These things, alas ! happen in the early 

 history of most colonies where black troops are employed. 

 How much more certain is it to have been the case in the Congo 

 Free State where at first the soldiers and labourers were 

 recruited from outside the colony, and the officials were 

 and still are drawn from all nations, and so not imbued with 

 the spirit of patriotism ? A\Tien it is known that many of 

 the tribes among themselves infhct barbarous punishments 

 of|^mutilations, of which I personally have seen several in- 

 stances, it is easy to see how wrong impressions can be 

 formed. And the| fact that many photographs of these 

 things find their way to Europe labelled, and rightly so, 



