58 A JOURNEY UP THE RIVER CONGO. 
Yelala, and further on, some handsome Dracewnas,* or 
dragon trees, in full blossom, with graceful sprays of 
small cream-coloured flowers depending from among the 
spikey leaves, the general aspect of the plant recalling — 
the Yuccas, to which it is distantly allied. It is the 
first and only time that I remember to have seen this 
Dracena on the Congo, and it seems curious to find it 
preserved thus in a village. Indeed, it is an interesting 
fact that so many plants should be found growing in the 
villages in this part of Africa, which are never to be seen 
in the open. The euphorbias, for instance, I have never 
seen in a wild state, so to speak, but they exist in all the 
villages on or near the Congo from Yelala to Bolobo. 
Their native name in Congo is “ Ndiza,” but although they 
are known and named, I never could ascertain that any 
superstitious value or importance was attached to them 
which would serve to explain their constant presence in 
native towns; perhaps the real solution of this fact, as also 
of the presence of large trees and luxuriant vegetation 
round the villages, is that all the uninhabited country is 
periodically set on fire by the natives, and that only in 
those places which the bush-fires do not reach can rich 
vegetation and forest trees exist. It is evident—and, 
indeed, the fact has struck Stanley, Schweinfurth, and 
most observant African travellers—that the grass fires 
must largely affect the “phytography” of Africa. 
The chief of Yelala I discovered by chance in the act of 
performing a very hasty toilet in my honour. He was 
wrapping a piece of velvet round his loins, in exchange for 
the dirty cloth that was his every-day dress. He added 
to this a long livery-coat, which must have been splendid 
in the days when it retained all its buttons, and then, 
issuing from his palisaded hut, he greeted me most politely. 
His name, he told me, was Ntété Mbongo, and he was 
chief of Yelala, of Kai, and of three other villages with 
very long names that I forget. A long, conical shaped 
head, like an Aztec; a pair of very fine expressive eyes, 
* Dracena Sapochinowki. 
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* 
CS 
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