The Eastern Congo 



it is not too much to hope that the Belgians, who now have 

 command of the country and are not hkely to forget their 

 experiences here during the war, will carry out a well-organised 

 survey of this interesting region. 



Lake Chohoa, in conjunction with the larger lake of 

 Mohazi, may be considered as the submerged part of a valley 

 without an outlet, which would account no doubt for its 

 dearth of large fish, for the largest fish to be found in this 

 lake does not exceed five or six inches. There are hippo 

 in the north-eastern extremity, which they seem to favour, 

 but no crocodiles anywhere in the lake. Water-fowl are 

 abundant and the pythons both here and in the papyrus 

 swamps of the Akanyaru assume huge dimensions and are 

 very commonly seen. A large specimen killed by one of 

 the Fathers, who show^ed me its photograph, measured twenty- 

 three feet eight inches long with the exceptional circum- 

 ference of thirty-nine inches ; the Father assured me that 

 this monster was so old and sluggish that the native children 

 from a village near-by were playing around and patting it 

 when he arrived on the scene. The Barundi have a strange 

 superstition regarding these animals and never kill them, 

 believing that to do so will bring down vengeance upon 

 those who do, by all their children becoming sterile. 



I was once privileged to witness some years ago on the 

 Luangwa River in Northern Rhodesia, a fight between an 

 adult male bushbuck and a heavy nineteen-foot python. 

 How, if the python had come off victor, he would have managed 

 to swallow the bushbuck is hard to surmise, for the circum- 

 ference of the antelope's body was about four times that 

 of the python's mouth. Personally, I am of the opinion 

 that the great snake, in a rash moment induced by hunger, 



36 



