246 ' Seven Years in Central Africa. [March, 
little girl following me, in charge of one of Msidi's young men, 
who told me that Msidi had sent the child after me, saying that 
if she was afraid of being beaten she had better follow the 
white man. So on she came with me to my cottage. I handed 
her over to the care of the other little girl, Mwepo, when, to my 
astonishment, they flew into each other's arms, embracing one 
another, and weeping. The two Luba free-born children had 
met again in my cottage after each had passed through her own 
three years of unmixed sorrow and hardship. It was several 
days before I was able to do anything with them, so continually 
did they hang round each other's necks. 
BRIDGE-BUILDING. 
Kalala^ March \Wi. — Had much trouble in crossing the Lunda 
rivers, as our route on this occasion lay further south, where 
the streams are wider. To-day we were detained six hours at the 
Luache. The river was very much swollen, and rushed past with 
such force that we could not bridge it in the usual way. As a 
rule, bridges are easily formed. Forked poles are cut, and the 
lower ends, when well sharpened, are sunk into the bed of the 
river, and worked into the mud or gravel by a rotary movement. 
Across two of these natural forks a bearer is laid. Three or four 
poles are then pushed out from the bank, resting upon the bearer 
and projecting ten or twelve feet beyond. These horizontal poles 
are weighted down on the bank end, so as to allow a man to 
creep out and place a bearer further out in the river, this opera- 
tion being repeated until the other bank is reached. Thus in a 
few hours a fair company of men can bridge quite a broad river 
if the depth is not great. Some men cut the poles in the 
forest, others carry them to the river's bank, whilst the more 
skilful give themselves to constructing the bridge. But to-day 
we found the Luache so swollen that it was not possible to place 
piles in the water, so we set to work to fell a large tree growing 
on the bank of the river. It was not long enough, however, to 
reach across ; but as there were some rocks in the middle, and 
more large trees on the other side, I proposed that some of the 
men should cross either above or below, and cut down one 
of the trees on the other side, and let them meet in the centre. 
They did so, but at great peril to their lives. One poor fellow 
