ACROSS AFRICA BY A WOMAN.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 282, 25 May 1912, Page 2 (Supplement)

ACROSS AFRICA BY A WOMAN.

MKETIXC WITH HIPPOS. Thi' Rev. John ]l. Harris and Mrs. Harris, who have just returned to England after a twelve months' trip across Africa, related to a representative of the Daily Chronicle some intensely interesting incidents of their experiences in I strange lands and among strange peoples. Mr. and Mrs. Harris are well-known to all those people who helped to overturn the hideous regime of King Leopold' in the Congo. It was purely upon their evidence as missionaries and as eye-wit-nesses of the-atrocious .brutalities of the old Belgian administration- that the Congo Reform Society based its great indictment, which triumphed at last over all the enemies of truth and humanity. Then they paid another visit to the Congo to investigate the conditions of the natives in the rubber countries under the new administration, and to go beyond the limit of those territories in a/general exploration of the conditions of life, and hibor among the natives of Southern Nigeria and other parts of Central Africa. The tribes of the territories explored by ,Mr. and Mrs. Harris include the Aruwimr peoples, famous for their hostility to Stanley's expedition; the Bangalas who suffered from the atrocious cruelties of Lacroix and Arnold; the warlike Budjas, oppressed by the iron hand of LotTiair's administration: and the Mongos, decimated by the Abir. They also made a tour of a wide area in the Kas'ai territory, where in many districts the natives are in revolt against the, present system of taxation and labor.

XICIHa 1 IX THE FOREST. Mr. Harris gladly admits that under the new regime atrocities appear to have ceased. In territories where King Leopold's agents formerly ruled by organised torture the natives have new hope and -a chance for ordinary human life. Nevertheless, there are still many abuses wind call for remedy, and the new system of taxation presses heavily upon people who find it difficult to provide the number of francs demanded by the officials. Yet anything is better than the old tribute, of rubber, the very memory of which still has a terror for the native mind. Mr. and Mrs. Harris travelled for the greater part of their long journey on foot, with a body of native carriers with their stores and baggage. They suffered many hardships, and the long marches were a severe test for a lady's courage. For days on end they tramped their way through the tropical undergrowth of great forests, where the high trees shut out the light of the sun, and at night they would pitch their camp and sleep in a little tent, in these solitudes. Mr. Harris, tired out, would sleep soundly, but Mrs. Harris, with more highly-strung nerves, would often lie awake iistening to the strange sounds that came from the dark forest.

CHASED BY ELEPHANTS.

"I used to hear." she said, "the cries of birds, which sounded like wild shrieks, or with harsh and horrible notes. Then there would be the bellowing of a hippopotamus, and sometimes the fierce voice of a leopard." The natives were afraid of leopards, and many a time at night they would abandon their posts of duty round the tent and steal away, because they believed they heard the approach of one of these beasts, leaving the open tent unguarded.

On one march in the Bangaal district tile husband 1 and wife had to walk across miles of marsh land, so boggy that they dtel& uj) to-their knees. -A frightful Smell rose from the rotten vegetation and foul water, which splashed them up to the neck, wetting them to the skin. "It was just like walking over a prodigious sponge," said Mr. Harris.

BARRIER OF HIPPOPOTAMI; Wet continually, they tramped for eight days at the rate o'f twenty miles a day, and one day, when they had been walking from seven in the morning until, eight at night in search of a village which, they had been told existed on a tributary of the Bangala river, they were lashed by a terific tornado. Shivering and soaked they arrived at the spot where they hoped to And shelter and refreshment, to find that the village no longer existed. They were without water and food for the carriers, they were exhausted by their long journey, they had been cut and pricked in the bush.' and now, when they realised that (hey would have to push on further, some of. the tall fellows, who were strong men and brave men, broke down and wept. As they were travelling down the river in four light skill's in the darkness of the night. Mr. and Mrs. Harris, with their black companions, had a strange and perilous adventure. Presently ahead of them they saw a native village, with cam]) (ires burning, and with new hope the men paddled fast towards this goal, lint suddenly Mr. Harris, who wa*s in the leading boat, saw a long dark line stretched in front of them. The lin* moved, and Mr. Harris saw the black bodies of big beasts making a living barrier across the river. With the swift sense of fear that they were travelling straight into a herd of elephants, he shouted to his men to steer for the bank. They plunged into th/> thick sedge, and instantly there rose about them swarms of mosquitoes, stinging and biting them. It turned out that the animals in the river were hippos, and not elephants; but in any case the peril was a great one. That'night they slept thankfully in the shelter of a little Roman Catholic chapel built in this far wilderness. The trackers fed largely upon fruit and veegtables. but the carriers required meat, and bad sharp' teeth for monkey llesh. "Paddling down the rivers. - ' said Mr. Harris, "we used to hear the monkeys chattering and calling to each other in the bush, and sometimes by a bough swaying up and down across the water we knew that monkeys were having a game there. Then our men would sit very still and quiet until one of them, with a gun. would kill his victim. As soon as the body fell all the men would give a deep groan, and then plunge overboard to swim for the dead monkey, leaving me alone in a canoe tipping up and down most dangerously. "The natives may almost be said to speak the monkey language. At least, they know the meaning of various cries and can imitate them perfectly. One day when there were monkeys in sight, and the men wanted a dinner, one of them squatted down, and, putting his fingers to his nostrils, made peculiar beast-like cries, like a female monkey calling out after her comrades. Sure enough, after a little while two monkeys approached in answer to the call." While Mr. Harris was lighting his way through the undergrowth. Mrs. Harris had busy eyes for all the sights of Nature in the African bush. With a note-hook in hand she jotted down, while she walked, notes of the strange things she passed on her way —queer forest' birds, new orchids and tropical (lowers, and the marvels of insect life. "Marly in the morning." she said, "one saw the life of Ihe bush most intimately. It was in the early hours after dawn, for instance, that I used to see armies of ants marching in great battalions from one camp to another."

■ One peril of the African forest was always present the poisonous fangs of deadly snakes. One day Mrs. Harris was sitting indoors when she saw a green picture frame on the wall suddenly move. From behind it there darted out the head of a great whip snake, which was killed witli the olow of an axe by Mr. Harris before it had obtained a victim. On another occasion a yellowish snake was coiled up on a enne-chair, so exactly similar in color tbat the casual eye would not observe the intruder. Mrs. Harris has faced the whole range of perilous adventures in Darkest Africa, and one of the narrowest escapes was in an elephant hunt. Four big elephants were within range of fire, and one of them was wounded. At the noise of the guns two of them raised their trunks and came charging along in the direction of .Mrs. Harris. At the shouts of the natives she ran towards the river bank, but found herself faced by an impassable bog. Death seemed very close to her, but fortunately the elephants wheeled round and went off at a hot pace. Afterwards, from the branches of a tree, she photographed her husband firing at one of the great beasts.

"I have never seen so many elephants," said Mrs. Harris, "as in this district. From the deck of a steamer that had come down the river I could see great herds of them moving about like cows in an English pasture." To many of the wild people met with Mrs. Harris was a living miracle. They had never seen a white woman, and some of them would not believe their eyes. Not even her long hair which she showed to them convinced them that she was not a man. And those who believed were shocked when she told them that she had left a baby at home in her own country in order to visit them. The African women accused her of being cruel. •

EVENING DRESS FOR NEGROES.

Mrs. Harris herself saw strange tvpes of humanity, distorted sometimes out of all human likeness by diseases that turn men into living horrors. She met old chiefs whose beards are long enough to touch the ground. She met friendly lepers who smiled at her from faces without features—grinning masks of terror. She met men and women whose legs and heads and breasts liad swollen monstrously—the victims, of elephantiasis. She met many eases of that awful sleeping sickness which the tsetse fly spreads through Villages and tribes so that men and women sleep themselves to death. Fortunately, these diseases are decreasing m proportion as the reform in administration is spreading over the Congo and other parts of Central Africa. "Below the Mohammedan belt,' says Mr. Harris, "paganism is breaking up, and the Christian missions—of all denominations—are doing splendid work." At homes in Togoland. for instance. there is a wonderful mission where the people are taught tailoring, engineering, carpentery, bootmaking and other trades] which they practise with as groat a skill as European workers, Mrs. Harris mentioned that ,she found people making evening dress suits in this district of rich black gentlemen who live in European style. Mr. Harris has many criticisms to make upon the existing condition of labor in the Congo, and in Portuguese Africa, and he points out there is nothing to prevent the old Leopold regime returning with all its abuses if the new spirit of reform is not vigilant and enduring. Many of the old Belgian officials are still in Africa with their bad traditions, but now, says Mr. Harris, "these men know that their misdeeds will not be tolerated by. the Belgian throne."