40 IV. JULY, 1913— JANUARY, 1914 
paths the heat is intolerable, for on either side of these 
narrow passages rises the forest in an impenetrable 
wall nearly loo feet high, and between these walls not 
a breath of air stirs. There is the same absence of 
air and movement in Lambarene, One seems to be 
living in a prison. If we could only cut down a corner 
of the forest which shuts in the lower end of the station 
we should get a little of the breeze in the river valley ; 
but we have neither the money nor the men for such 
an attack on the trees. The only relief we have is that 
in the dry season the river sandbanks are exposed, and 
we can take our exercise upon them and enjoy the 
breeze which blows upstream. 
It had been originally intended to put the hospital 
buildings on the ridge of high ground on which the 
boys’ school stands, but as the site was both too far 
away and too small, I had arranged with the staff of 
the station that I should be given a place for it at the 
foot of the hill on which I myself lived, on the side next 
the river. This decision had, however, to be confirmed 
by the Conference of Missionaries which had been called 
to meet at Samkita at the end of July. So I went there 
with Mr. Ellenberger and Mr. Christol, to put my case, 
and that was my first long journey in a canoe. 
* 
* * 
We started one misty morning two hours before day- 
break, the two missionaries and myself sitting one 
behind the other in long folding chairs in the bow. 
The middle of the canoe was filled with our tin boxes, 
our folded camp-bedsteads, the mattresses, and with 
the bananas which formed the rations of the natives. 
Behind these things were the twelve rowers in six 
