Mr. Brace Bredlu 
Greenville 
Bplaware 
October 21, 195it 
tear Bruces 
Since you sere her® 1 suffered the loss of sother, uteo died in 
her 9$ih year Sunday Bornii^. To us sh^ was a wonc^rfal Bother and one 
on whc® we leaned in spite of her age. It was a sli^it stroke, which 
did not mend, and she was ill Just two weeks. 
Today is the first opportunity that I have t*ad to begin to line up 
things for your contemplated Congo tj^ditioo, and what I report to you 
now is bat tentative. However, it will give you some idea of i«at I 
have in mind, so that you can laake su<& changes as you may desire. 
This is toe way things stack up at the meaient. Tou can go fr«^ 
Mew York to the mouth of the Congo to toe port of Matadi by freighter, 
A Belgian line, wiiich goes direct, mates the trip in 15 days. Ctae or 
two other lines take nearer a month for the trip, but they stop in at 
scese very interesting ports— Dakar , Liberia, the Gold Coast, and on© or 
two others. These stops are what lengthen out the freighter trip, 
- ^ 
From Matadi to Leopoldville it is reeoKff^nded that we go by train, 
though one csri go by ste®ser. From Le<^ldvllle to StSblcy^m® hy 
steamer takes 7 days. Hoover, it «igj*t be worth i*ile to l^eak the trip 
at Coquilhatville, where one can spend a few days. There are frequent 
steamers up the river at all times, Souto of Stanleyville there is ex- 
tremely interesting and little-visited country about the town of 
Pontiderrille, 
An this I get fro® Baron Dhanis, teo is the attach! at the Belgian 
Hmbassy for Congo affairs. His father was a .foraor goveriwr in the Congo 
and was the man, I understand, vAio routed out toe vicious Arab slave 
traders wte gave the Congo such a bad ca» in the early days. Baron 
Dhanis premises »e a nintoer of helpful letters, both to a person on the 
governor’s staff in Leopoldville, teo spent scs^ tin© in America, mo to 
the resident agent in the village of Biondo soato of Ponthierville, At 
Bioado the native fishermen, wiio are most wonderful boateen, stage a 
shooting of the Lualaba rapids that is smetiiing that has^seld<®, if ever 
been ^«otograpted, and is on# of the most thrilling, albeit one of ttie 
scat daw^^rous "rides** that one can take, We can have a canoe race 
staged there, canoes that have paddlers in them, that is cat of tsiis 
worW. The Baron was most enthusiastic about it. He Is^ shot t»'i* 
rapids himself, and knows toe erdef ti»ere, Kongamba, ?dio would put his 
trlbeasen through their paces for us. 
