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Updated: May 4, 2025
It is indeed extraordinary how the savage can be changed into a civilised being by a few years of military discipline. I reach Dzamba again on the 29th and continue the journey in canoe on the next day. The current is running swiftly down the Itimbiri and after an hour we arrive at a rapid and march through the forest while the canoe descends without passengers.
The paddlers, on the other hand, cannot be called lazy, and when propelling canoes against strong currents or up rapids, exert themselves to the utmost. We leave Bumba on December 9th in the Delivrance and turn up stream. After passing the mouth of the Itimbiri the banks are unoccupied for many miles, dense unbroken forest lining each shore.
They rarely, if ever, return to their native villages, which they left seven or ten years before as naked savages, for they are now smart civilised men and imitate the appearance and manners of the Europeans as closely as possible. About 6 p.m. we reach the Post of Mandungu, situated on the right bank of the Itimbiri. It is very well built and scrupulously tidy.
The more I saw of the Congo River it is nearly twice as large as the Mississippi the more I realized that it is in reality a parent of waters. It has half a dozen tributaries that range in length from 500 to 1,000 miles each. The most important are the Lualaba and the Kasai. Others include the Itimbiri, the Aruwimi and the Mubangi.
And the commerce of these nations ebbed and flowed along a road of unknown age, running from Itimbiri to Batubenge, about six hundred miles in length. This highway was destroyed by the 'missionaries of civilization' from Arabia only toward the close of the eighteenth century.
The Delivrance a steamer built on the same lines as the Florida arrives at Ibembo on December 5th with a large cargo of cloth, clothes, beads, salt and other articles for barter, and also cases of food for the Europeans. This is almost her last voyage up the Itimbiri this season, for soon the waters will have fallen so low that the river will be navigable only by canoes.
The Itimbiri indeed, like its principal feeders, the Likati and Rubi, is rapidly falling, for the dry season has now commenced in earnest, and although thunder-storms are frequent, they are not accompanied by rain. We stop at Moenge, a small post on the left bank of the river, for the mail, and then on again until the Congo is reached an hour before sunset.
We leave at sunrise which is, however, concealed by a thick water mist and speed along until we reach Dzamba or Ekwanga-tana close to the point where the Likati and Rubi rivers join to form the Itimbiri. Dzamba is a transit port where cargoes are transhipped from canoes into a small steamer the Milz which plies between it and Buta the capital of Uele.
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