THE RELIEF OF EMIN PASHA 
362 
of the river guard, Stanley plunged into the great forest of the Aru- 
wimi on the 28th of June, with a force of about four hundred men. 
Month after month rolled by, but no voice came out of the still¬ 
ness to speak of his progress or safety. As time went on, and the sus¬ 
pense became more acute, expectation gave way to disappointment, and 
disappointment to misgiving and doubt. Now and again rumors came 
through native channels—rumors of famine and disease, fighting, 
defeat, capture—rumors even of death. They came to the east coast 
and the west, and thence were sent to Europe. They filtrated through 
the Soudan and reached Egypt. The Khalifa and his fanatical lieu¬ 
tenants seized them and converted them into reports of Mahdist tri¬ 
umphs. Emin was defeated, and he and Stanley captured! The 
clouds thickened, and the continuing silence deepened the gloom which 
hung over the equatorial province. Where was Stanley during all 
these months? It was not until 1889 that the answer came in letters 
from the long-vanished traveler. 
On leaving his rear-guard entrenched at Yambuya, Stanley, with 
the main body of the expedition, followed the bank of the Aruwimi, 
and very soon made acquaintance with that native hostility which was 
to dog his steps almost to the very end. For, at their approach to the 
first town of importance, the natives, warned by the loud beating of 
their watchman's drum, set fire to their frail huts, and withdrew into 
ambush in the forest, there to await the passing of the advancing 
strangers. Now the approach to these towns in the river valley was 
in itself a glaring example of the subtleties of savage warfare, for 
the path was honey-combed with shallow pits, which were filled with 
splinters, so sharply pointed as practically to be skewers, and hidden 
from the sight of all but the most experienced by a light layer of leaves 
and branches. To add to the deception, these approaches were cleared 
by the forest people for some hundred yards or so, and formed—what 
is so unusual in Central Africa—a wide and direct avenue to the vil¬ 
lage. The real approach would be narrow and tortuous, making a 
wide detour, and the apparently direct path all the more alluring. 
And then, with a fine sense of strategic warfare the natives would 
pour their poisoned arrows and spears upon the expedition at the 
very moment when the discovery of the hidden pit’s had thrown it into 
