198 A JOURNEY UP THE RIVER CONGO. 
occupiers of the hut, musicians, wives, and patient, turn 
out into the open, panting, laughing, and wiping the sweat 
from their glistening bodies. Jars of sweet and pleasant-_ 
tasting palm wine from the Malebu, or Hyphcene palms, 
is brought in by slaves, and all present, including ourselves, 
take a drink, Makolé participating freely. Although he 
is bound to keep silent, he makes up for want of verbal 
welcome by the most effusive grins: in fact his face is 
wreathed in fatuous smiles, for he is evidently highly self- 
conscious, and imagines himself to be an interesting figure 
to the white men who have come to witness his “cure.” 
His friends tell us he is suffering from headache, and to 
co:roborate this, he himself points to his temples and 
forehead, which are painted with white pigment. But 
probably the whole affair is got up to serve as an excuse 
for a bout of malafu drinking and a erand function. 
We return to the station by canoe, going down stream 
merrily and at a great rate. 
The sun is very near setting as we arrive, so Janssen 
goes off to the goat’s paddock to set a trap for the leopard 
in the little time of remaining daylight. He arranges a 
sort of narrow “boma,” or three-sided structure of high 
stakes, at the end of which a bleating kid is- tied to the 
triggers of three loaded guns, which are so placed that 
they command the only exit from the trap. The leopard, 
in the act of seizing the kid, will discharge the contents of 
the muskets into his body, and ought to die then and 
there from the effect.* Whilst Janssen is doing this, I 
am watching the sunset from the verandah. It is a 
beautiful scene, and one that makes me indignantly con- 
tradict certain writers who maintain that the tropics, both — 
in flower-shows and fine sunsets, are inferior to the 
temperate zones. 
To day the sun’s career has been somewhat troubled, 
like that of many an earthly monarch. His rule at first 
was tranquil and undisputed. Then came the fearful 
* On this occasion the creature did receive the whole charge of the 
three guns, but nevertheless afterwards managed, though riddled with 
bullets, to leap the ten-foot-high fence with kid, guns, and all, and drag 
itself to die in an adjuining field. 
