The Eastern Congo 



the precaution to paint it with six gallons of crude castor 

 oil to ward off the attacks of " beetle " and then sewed it 

 up in its final covering. 



This was by no means the last of it, however, for by this 

 time the size and weight of skin had been exaggerated by 

 the natives beyond all conception, with the result that the 

 one transport company in the little centre of Fort Jameson, 

 known as the African Lakes Corporation, refused to accept 

 it for transportation, after offering it to several gangs of 

 porters and after it had been adjudged by the authorities 

 as too heavy for porterage. For some considerable time it 

 lay in the roadway, near the township, a " white elephant " 

 if ever there was one and a menace to traffic, until, through 

 the assistance of my friend C, a man for whom the Achewa 

 would do more than most, it eventually took its way to Tete 

 on the Zambezi, a distance of 220 miles, in charge of a good 

 headman and forty porters, accompanied by an extra gang 

 of men who went in advance with axes to chop down the bush. 

 For several weeks after this both C. and myself went in fear 

 and trembling lest the headman should turn up with the news 

 that the carriers had bolted. It safely reached the river, 

 however, and after a time was shipped on a barge and so 

 found its way to England, via Chinde on the east coast. 



This is not quite all, for to get the mounted specimen 

 through the portals of the South Kensington Museum 

 necessitated an alteration in their structure. I can, there- 

 fore, well believe that my friend Mr. J. B. Burlace, the 

 managing director for Messrs. Rowland Ward, Ltd., was as 

 pleased to see the last of it as I was. 



Knowing the difficulties before me, it stands to my credit 

 that a year afterwards I took on another contract and landed 



236 



