Poor Lobo made a gesture of impatience, but saw that I had quite determined to afford him no shadow of an opportunity to make any secret communication whatever; so he submitted to the inevitable, and sent for one of his men, to whom he delivered such a message as I suggested, adding a request that a small supply of clothing might be sent off to him at once. This ended the matter, so far as the obtaining of an efficient interpreter was concerned; the clothes were brought off; and shortly after noon we weighed and, with a brisk breeze, stood out of the creek on our way up the river.
For the first twelve miles or so our course was the same as that which we had followed in our memorable expedition to attack Chango Creek; the river being, up to that point, about three miles wide, with a fine deep channel averaging perhaps a quarter of that width up as far as abreast the southern extremity of Monpanga island, where this deep channel terminates, and the average depth of the entire stream dwindles to about six fathoms for the next fourteen miles, the channel at the same time narrowing down to a width varying from about two miles to less than half-a-mile in some parts, notably at the spot where it begins to thread its devious way among the islands that cumber the stream for a length of fully thirty miles, at a distance of about twenty-eight miles from Shark Point.
By carrying a press of sail, and hugging the northern bank, keeping as close to the shore as our little draught of water would permit, thus to a great extent cheating the current, we contrived to get as far as the spot where the above-mentioned chain of islands commences; and there, the wind failing us toward sunset, we came to an anchor close to the southern shore, on a sand-bank, in three fathoms, under the lee of a large island that sheltered us from the rush of the main current; and there we remained all night, a strict anchor-watch of course being kept not only to see that the schooner did not drive from her berth, but also to guard against possible attack on the part of the natives. In this spot, to my inexpressible chagrin, we were compelled to spend the following two days, the wind blowing down the river, when it blew at all, a little variety being infused into the weather by the outburst of a most terrific thunderstorm which brought with it a perfect hurricane of wind and a deluge of rain; after which we again got a fair wind and were able to pursue our way for a time, getting ashore occasionally upon unsuspected sand-banks, but always contriving to heave off again, undamaged, thanks to the fact that we were proceeding up-stream against the current instead of down-stream with it. And—not to dwell unduly upon incidents that were exciting enough to us, although the recital of them would prove of but little interest to the reader—in this way we contrived to creep up the river the hundred and twelve miles or so that were necessary to bring us to Matadi’s town—having passed, and with some difficulty avoided, two whirlpools on the way, reaching our destination about two bells in the afternoon watch on the fifth day after leaving Banana Creek.
Chapter Twenty.
Success. The Fate of the Pirate Slaver.
Matadi’s “town” was situate, as Lobo had informed us, on the south bank of the stream, on the sloping side of a hill that rose rather steeply from the water’s edge; the scenery of this part of the river being totally different from that of the mouth; the change occurring gradually, but becoming quite decided about the point where the chain of islands is left behind on the traveller’s upward way. For whereas on the lower reaches of the Congo—that is to say, for the first forty miles or so from its mouth—the banks of the river are low and flat, and to a great extent mangrove-lined, beyond this point their tendency is to become higher and steeper, in some places, indeed, quite precipitous, until where we now were the ground sloped up from the river margin to a height of fully four hundred feet, for the most part densely covered with bush interspersed here and there with masses of noble forest trees.
Matadi’s town was situate, as I have said, upon the sloping hillside that constituted the south bank of the river, and consisted of some four or five hundred buildings arranged with tolerable regularity on either side of two broad streets or roads that crossed each other at right angles, their point of intersection being a spacious square, in the centre of which stood a circular structure with a high-peaked, pointed roof of thatch, that Lobo informed me was the fetish-house. I was greatly surprised at the neatness and skill displayed in the construction of the buildings in this important town; for while they were insignificant in size, as compared with the dwellings of a civilised race, being about the size of a small two-roomed cottage, such as may be found in almost any rural district in England, they were very considerably larger and more carefully and substantially-built than the huts that we had noticed in King Plenty’s town, when we made our disastrous attack upon Mendouca and his consorts. There was even a certain attempt at ornamentation discernible in the larger structures, many of which had what I believe is called in England a barge-board, elaborately carved, under the projecting eaves of the roof that formed the verandah, the wooden posts that supported those same projecting eaves being also boldly sculptured. These particulars I noted through my telescope on rounding the bend of the river just beyond the town; and I could not help feeling that a community of savages intellectual enough to find pleasure in the adornment of their houses would be likely to prove very difficult to deal with unless I could contrive to make their inclination coincide with my own wishes.
Our appearance—the Felicidad being probably the first ship that had ever penetrated so far up the river—created a profound sensation in the town, the inhabitants rushing in and out of their dwellings and about the streets for all the world like an alarmed colony of ants, and finally congregating along the margin of the river to the extent of fully one thousand, most of them being men, every one of whom, so far as I could make out, was armed; the weapons being spears, bows and arrows, and clubs with heavy knobs on the end. They seemed to be a fine, powerful race, evidently accustomed to warfare, if one might judge by the readiness with which, at the command of an immensely stout and powerful man—whom Lobo declared to be none other than Matadi himself—they formed themselves up into compact and orderly squadrons, and I thought, ruefully, that if it became necessary to resort to forcible measures for the release of our countrymen, we were likely to have a pretty bad time.