Part 10 (2/2)

But about the land inseparably associated with the econos a shroud of uncertainty as to regio there and its literature, save that which grew out of the atrocity caer and unsatisfactory To the vast majority of persons, therefore, the country is lobe Its very distance lends enchanthtens the lure that always lurks in the unknown

What is it like? What is its place in the universal productive scheo to find out My journey there was the logical sequel to my visit to the Union of South Africa and Rhodesia, which I have already described It seeion that I had read about in the books of Stanley In my childhood I heard him tell the story of some of his African experiences The ettable for he incarnated both the ideal and the adventure of journalisered to see this mother of waters Thus it cah the heart of Equatorial Africa but spent weeks floating down the historic streaured in the Great War, has a distinct and definite human quality The Marne, the Meuse, and the Soo is the River of Adventure

In writing, as in everything else, preparedness is all essential I learned the value of carrying proper credentials during the hen every frontier and police official constituted hiress For the South African end of e and so I realized that I would require equally powerful agencies to help h sparsely settled Central Africa with its millions of natives, scattered white settlements, and restricted and sometimes primitive means of transport, was a far different proposition than travelling in the Cape Colony, the Transvaal, or Rhodesia, where there are through trains and habitable hotels

I knew that in the Congo the State was ly, I obtained what aian Colonial Office to all functionaries to help ht add, was really a co Albert, hom I had an hour's private audience at Brussels before I sailed As I sat in the simple office of the Palace and talked with this shy, tall, blonde, and really kingly-looking person, I could not help thinking of the last ti that terrible winter of 1916-1917, when the Gerian ruler had taken refuge in this bleak, sea-swept corner of Belgium and the only part of the country that had escaped the invader He lived in a little chalet near the beach Every day the King walked up and down on the sands while Geruns at Dix what seemed to be a forlorn hope and he betrayed his anxiety in face and speech Now I beheld him fresh and buoyant, and monarch of the only country in Europe that had really settled down to work

King Albert asked me many questions about o in 1908 (he was then Prince Albert), when he covered lad that an Ao at first hand and he expressed his keen appreciation of the work of A colony overseas ”I like America and Americans,” he said, ”and I hope that your country will not forget Europe” There was a warm clasp of the hand and I was off on the first lap of the journey that was to reel off more than twenty-six thousand miles of strenuous travel before I saw ain

Before we invade the Congo let me briefly outline its history It can be told in a feords although the narrative of its exploitations remains a serial without end Prior to Stanley's memorable journey of exploration across Equatorial Africa which he described in ”Through the Dark Continent,” what is now the Congo was a blank spot on the stone had opened up part of the present British East Africa and Nyassaland In the Luapula and its tributaries he discovered the headwaters of the Congo River and then continued on to Victoria Falls and Rhodesia After Stanley found the faanyika in 1872, he returned to Zanzibar Hence the broad expanse of Central Africa from Nyassaland ard practically remained undiscovered until Stanley crossed it between 1874 and 1877, when he travelled froins, down its expanse to the sea

As soon as Stanley's articles about the Congo began to appear, King Leopold, as a shrewd business man, saw an opportunity for the expansion of his little country Under his auspices several International Committees dedicated to African study were foranize a string of stations from the ocean up to Stanley Falls, now Stanleyville In 1885 the faress of Nations, presided over by Biso Free State, accepted Leopold as its sovereign, and the jungle doovern the founders were the suppression of the slave trade and the conversion of the territory into a coely due to Belgian initiative that the traffic in hus which denuded all Central Africa of its bone and sinew every year, was brought to an end

The world is o history In 1904 arose the first protest against the so-called atrocities perpetrated on the blacks, and the Congo became the center of an international dispute that nearly lost Belgiuht of the revelations brought about by the Great War, and to which I have referred in a previous chapter, it is obvious that a considerable part of this crusade had its origin in Gerer Case the World War E D Morel, his principal associate in the atrocity ca to sle a seditious document into an enemy country

With the atrocity business we are not concerned The only atrocities that I saw in the Congo were the slaughter of my clothes on the native washboard, usually a rock, and the American jitney that broke down and left ian rule in the Congo has swung round to another extrero there has more freedom of movement and less responsibility for action than in any other African colony To round out this brief history, the Congo was ceded to Belgiuian colony ever since

We can now go on with the journey From Bulawayo I travelled northward for three days past Victoria Falls and Broken Hill, through the undeveloped reaches of Northern Rhodesia, where you can sometimes see lion-tracks froe fro trains Until recently the telegraph service was considerably impaired by the curiosity of elephants who insisted upon knocking down the poles

While I was in South Africa alaro and I was afraid that it would interfere with my journey This strike ithout doubt one of the most unique in the history of all labor troubles The whole Congo administration ”walked out,” when their request for an increase in pay was refused The strikers included Governraph and telephone employes, and steamboat captains Even the one-time cannibals employed on all public construction quit work It was a natural procedure for theation on the rivers ceased The country was paralyzed Happily for ht I crossed the Congo border and stopped for the customs at Sakania At once I realized the potency that lay in my royal credentials for all traffic was tied up until I was expedited I also got the initial surprise of the many that awaited me in this part of the world

In the popular o is an annex of the Inferno I can vouch for the fact that soreeted ht have been wafted down from Greenland's icy ht of the station the natives shi+vered in their blankets The at but tropical yet I was al distance of the Equator The reason for this frigidity was that I had entered the confines of the Katanga, the o and a plateau four thousand feet above sea level

[Illustration: LORD LEVERHULME]

[Illustration: ROBERT WILLIAMS]

The next afternoon I arrived at Elizabethville, naians, capital of the province, and center of the copper activity Here I touched two significant things One was the group of Aineers who have developed the technical side of o; the other was a contact with the industry which produces a considerable part of the wealth of the Colony

There is a wide iricultural country Although it has unlimited possibilities in this direction, the reverse, for the hty-eight tiiuh Nature has been prodigal in her share of the develop of which loosed the stor Leopold's head, is nearly exhausted because of the one-ti Cotton and coffee are infant industries The principal product of the soil, coain doesis, in a, which is really one huge ion so far as bulk of output is concerned Since this area figures so prominently in the econo attention Like so many parts of Africa, its exploitation is recent For years after Livingstone planted the gospel there, it continued to be the haunt of warlike tribes The earliest white visitors observed that the natives wore copper ornaments and trafficked in a rude St Andrew's cross--it was the coin of the country--fashi+oned out of hties and nineties they found scores of old copper o Before the advent of civilization the Katanga blacks dealt mainly in slaves and in copper

The real pioneer of developlishue of Cecil Rhodes, and who constructed, as you may possibly recall, the link in the Cape-to-Cairo Railway froo border He has done for Congo copper what Lord Leverhulme has accoo progress is almost entirely due to alien capital

Williams, as born in Aberdeen, Scotland, went out to Africa in 1881 to take charge of so machinery at one of the Kimberley diaan which continued until the death of the empire builder On his death-bed Rhodes asked Williams to continue the Cape-to-Cairo project In the acquiescence to this request the Katanga indirectly owes much of its advance Thus the constructive influence of the Colossus of South Africa extends beyond the British do the Broken Hill Railway Williams was prompted by two reasons One was to carry on the Rhodes project; the other was to link up what he believed to be a whole newin the dark Late in the nineties he had sent George Grey, a brother of Sir Edward, now Viscount Grey, through the present Katanga region on a prospecting expedition Grey discovered large deposits of copper and also tin, lead, iron, coal, platinuanized the coanyika Concessions, which beca

Subsequently the Union Miniere du Haut Kantanga was foranyika Concessions acquired more than forty per cent of its capital The Union Miniere took over all the concessions and discoveries of the British corporation The Union Miniere is now the leading industrial institution in the Katanga and its story is really the narrative of a considerable phase of Congo developrown fro outfit in the wilderness, two hundred and fiftyat the time of my visit more than 1,000 white men and 15,000 blacks It operates four completely equipped mines which produced nearly 30,000 tons of copper in 1917, and a smelter with an annual capacity of 40,000 tons of copper A concentrator capable of handling 4,000 tons of ore per day is nearing co industrial coo disclosed

Equally rerowth of Elizabethville, the one wonder town of the Congo In 1910, when the railway arrived, it was a geographical expression,--a spot in the jungle dohout Central Africa, soh The white population nu place with over 2,000 whites and 12,000 blacks There are one third as a Province as in all the rest of the Congo combined, and its area is scarcely a fourth of that of the colony

The father of Elizabethville is General Eo history He caht natives, and played a big part in the settlement of the country He has been Governor-General of the Colony, Vice-Governor-General of the Katanga and is now Honorary Vice-Governor

In the prio fashi+on, on a bicycle, in flannel shi+rt and leggins and he continued this rough-and-ready attire when he becah-placed civil servant