I Will Not Bore You With My Diary In Detail Regarding Our Land
Journey, Because The Water-Washed Little Volume
Attributive to this
period is mainly full of reports of law cases, for reasons
hereinafter to be stated; and at
Night, when passing through this
bit of country, I was usually too tired to do anything more than
make an entry such as: "5 S., 4 R. A., N.E Ebony. T. 1-50, etc.,
etc." - entries that require amplification to explain their
significance, and I will proceed to explain.
Our first day's march was a very long one. Path in the ordinary
acceptance of the term there was none. Hour after hour, mile after
mile, we passed on, in the under-gloom of the great forest. The
pace made by the Fans, who are infinitely the most rapid Africans I
have ever come across, severely tired the Ajumba, who are canoe men,
and who had been as fresh as paint, after their exceedingly long
day's paddling from Arevooma to M'fetta. Ngouta, the Igalwa
interpreter, felt pumped, and said as much, very early in the day.
I regretted very much having brought him; for, from a mixture of
nervous exhaustion arising from our M'fetta experiences, and a touch
of chill he had almost entirely lost his voice, and I feared would
fall sick. The Fans were evidently quite at home in the forest, and
strode on over fallen trees and rocks with an easy, graceful stride.
What saved us weaklings was the Fans' appetites; every two hours
they sat down, and had a snack of a pound or so of meat and aguma
apiece, followed by a pipe of tobacco.
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