ommission so I started at daybreak in a whale-boat
manned by forty naked native paddlers.

The fog still hung over the countryside and the scene as we got under
way was like a Rackham drawing of goblins and ghosts. I sat forward in
the boat with the ranks of singing, paddling blacks behind me. From the
moment we started and until I landed, the boys kept up an incessant
chanting. One of their number sat forward and pounded the iron gunwale
with a heavy stick. When he stopped pounding the paddlers ceased their
efforts. The only way to make the Congo native work is to provide him
with noise.

All day we travelled down the river through schools of hippopotami, some
of them near enough for me to throw a stone into the cavernous mouths.
The boat capita told me that he would get to Kabambaie by sundown. Like
the average New York restaurant waiter, he merely said what he thought
his listener wanted to hear. I fervently hoped he was right because we
not only had a series of rapids to shoot up-river, but at Kabambaie is a
seething whirlpool that has engulfed hundreds of natives and their
boats. At sunset we had only passed through the first of the troubled
zones. Nightfall without a moon found me still moving, and with the
swirling eddy far ahead.

I had many close calls during the war. They ranged from the first-line
trenches of France, Belgium, and Italy to the mine fields of the North
Sea while a winter gale blew. I can frankly say that I never felt such
apprehension as on the face of those surging waters, with black night
and the impenetrable jungle about me. The weird singing of the paddlers
only heightened the suspense. I thought that every tight place would be
my last. Finally at eight o'clock, and after it seemed that I had spent
years on the trip, we bumped up against the shore of Kabambaie, within a
hundred feet of the fatal spot.

The faithful Moody, who preceded me, had revived life in the jonah
jitney and at dawn the next day we started at full speed and reached
Djoko Punda by noon. The "Madeleine" was waiting for me with steam up,
for I sent a runner ahead. I had ordered Nelson back from Kabambaie
because plenty of servants were available there. He spent his week of
idleness at Djoko Punda in exploring every food known to the country. At
one o'clock I was off on the first real stage of my homeward journey.
The swift current made the downward trip much faster than the upward and
I was not sorry.

As we neared B