t to see two
unmistakable American figures standing on the bank. What cheered me
further were two American motor cars nearby.

The two Americans proved to be G. D. Moody and J. E. Robison. The former
is Assistant Chief Engineer of the Forminiere in the field and the
latter is in charge of the motor transport. They gave me a genuine
American welcome and that night I dined in Robison's grass house off
American food that had travelled nearly fifteen thousand miles. I heard
the first unadulterated Yankee conversation that had fallen on my ears
since I left Elizabethville two months before. When I said that I wanted
to push on to Tshikapa at once, Moody said, "We will leave at five in
the morning in one of the jitneys and be in Tshikapa tomorrow night."
Moody was an incorrigible optimist as I was soon to discover.

IV

At dawn the next morning and after a breakfast of hot cakes we set out.
Nelson was in a great state of excitement because he had never ridden in
an automobile before. He was destined not to enjoy that rare privilege
very long. The rough highway hewed by American engineers through the
thick woods was a foot deep in sand and before we had proceeded a
hundred yards the car got stuck and all hands save Moody got out to push
it on. Moody was the chauffeur and had to remain at the wheel. Draped in
fog, the jungle about me had an almost eerie look. But aesthetic and
emotional observations had to give way to practicality. Laboriously the
jitney snorted through the sand and bumped over tree stumps. After a
strenuous hour and when we had reached the open country, the machine
gave a groan and died on the spot. We were on a broad plain on the
outskirts of a village and the broiling sun beat down on us.

The African picaninny has just as much curiosity as his American brother
and in ten minutes the whole juvenile population was assembled around
us. Soon the grown-ups joined the crowd. Naked women examined the tires
as if they were articles of food and black warriors stalked about with
the same sort of "I told you so" expression that you find in the face of
the average American watching a motor car breakdown. Human nature is the
same the world over. The automobile is a novelty in these parts and when
the Forminiere employed the first ones the natives actually thought it
was an animal that would finally get tired and quit. Mine stopped
without getting tired!

For six hours Moody laboured under the car while I sat in t