ELEPHANT HUNTING, ETC. 203 



in a hut, which he pointed out. The captain immediately 

 entered it and saw one white man stretched out on a couch 

 and another seated at his side. "Which is Mr. Rogers.^^" 

 he asked. "Mr. Rogers has been shot," answered the man 

 seated by the couch. The one who was lying on it drew 

 a revolver, and pointing it at Captain Fox, said: "Yes, and 

 by your men. I did not think they could kill old Rogers, 

 but they have got him this time. Still you are on Belgian 

 territory and you stand more chance for arrest than I do." 

 The captain's position was a rather ticklish one, but he 

 stood his ground bravely, and ere many minutes had passed 

 Rogers was in his death agony, and he expired, defiant to the 

 last. 



The wholesale destruction of human life and of property 

 entailed by the ruthless search for ivory by Arab traders in 

 the Congo region, before the establishment of more orderly 

 conditions in that territory, is eloquently stated in the fol- 

 lowing words by the great African traveller, Henry M. Stan- 

 ley, in his account of his expedition to this part of Africa 

 in 1887-88.* 



"Every tusk, piece, and scrap of ivory in the possession 

 of an Arab trader has been steeped in human blood. Every 

 pound weight has cost the life of a man, woman, or child; 

 for every five pounds a hut has been burned; for every two 

 tusks a whole village has been destroyed; every twenty 

 tusks have been obtained at the price of a district with all 

 its people, villages, and plantations. It is simply incredible 

 that, because ivory is required for ornaments or billiard 

 games, the rich heart of Africa should be laid waste at this 

 late year of the nineteenth century, and that native popu- 

 lations, tribes, and nations should be utterly destroyed. 

 Whom does all this bloody seizure enrich .^^ Only a few 

 dozens of half-castes, Arab and Negro, who, if due justice 



*Stanley, "In Darkest Africa," London, 1897, p. 153. 



