8 I. HOW I CAME TO BE A DOCTOR IN THE FOREST 
land, but the route proved to be impracticable for 
trade on account of the difficulties caused by the rapids 
in the upper part of the Ogowe. The construction of 
the Belgian-Congo railway between Matadi and Brazza- 
ville was finished in 1898, and this put a final end to 
any idea of making the Ogowe a way to the Congo. 
To-day the Ogowe is used only by the traffic which 
goes up to its own still comparatively unexplored 
hinterland. 
The first Protestant missionaries on the Ogowe were 
Americans, who came there about i860, but as they 
could not comply with the requirement of the French 
Government that they should give their school instruc- 
tion in French, they resigned their work later on to the 
Paris Missionary Society. 
To-day this society owns four stations : N’Gomo, 
Lambarene, Samkita, and Talagouga. N’Gomo is 
about 140 miles from the coast, and the others follow 
one another in that order at intervals of about 35 miles. 
Talagouga is situated on a picturesque island just in 
front of N’Djole, which is the farthest point to which 
the river steamer goes. 
At each Protestant mission station there are generally 
one unmarried and two married missionaries, and, as a 
rule, a woman teacher also, making five or six persons, 
without reckoning the children. 
The Catholic mission has three stations in the same 
district : one in Lambarene, one in N’Djole, and one 
near Samba, on the N’Gounje, the largest tributary of 
the Ogowe, and on each station there live about ten 
whites : usually three priests, two lay brothers, and 
five sisters. 
The administrative officials of the district are 
