This is what Lady MacDonald would term a chatty little
incident; and my hair begins to rise as I remember what I have been
told about those Fans and the indications I have already seen of its
being true when on the Upper Ogowe.
Now here we are going to try to
get through the heart of their country, far from a French station,
and without the French flag. Why did I not obey Mr. Hudson's orders
not to go wandering about in a reckless way! Anyhow I am in for it,
and Fortune favours the brave. The only question is: Do I
individually come under this class? I go into details. It seems
Pagan thinks he can depend on the friendship of two Fans he once met
and did business with, and who now live on an island in Lake Ncovi -
Ncovi is not down on my map and I have never heard of it before -
anyhow thither we are bound now.
Each man has brought with him his best gun, loaded to the muzzle,
and tied on to the baggage against which I am leaning - the muzzles
sticking out each side of my head: the flint locks covered with
cases, or sheaths, made of the black-haired skins of gorillas,
leopard skin, and a beautiful bright bay skin, which I do not know,
which they say is bush cow - but they call half a dozen things bush
cow. These guns are not the "gas-pipes" I have seen up north; but
decent rifles which have had the rifling filed out and the locks
replaced by flint locks and converted into muzzle loaders, and many
of them have beautiful barrels.
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