Despite what are regarded by some impulsive people as the higher claims of humanitarianism, we are perfectly willing to trust to Mr. Stanley’s sense of right as modified by the exigencies of a situation about which no one else can know as much as himself. That situation was altogether new and peculiar on both his ascents of the Congo in behalf of the Congo Free State, and in search of Emin Pasha. In the first instance he bore a commission from a higher power, the International Commission, whose agent he was. He had instructions to do certain things and to leave others undone. To provoke hostilities with those he met, to quarrel and fight, except in self-preservation, were not only things foreign to his mission, as being sure to defeat it, but were expressly forbidden to him. Conquest was no part of the new policy of the Congo Free State, but its foundation was peace and free concession by all the tribes within its boundaries. Time will vindicate his leniency in the midst of such scenes as he was forced to witness at the mouth of the Aruwimi and on the Congo above, during his first ascent of the river.
And the same will prove true of his second ascent. To be sure, he was on a different mission and had greater freedom of action, but he knew well, from former experience, the character of the peoples upon the two great rivers near their jurisdiction. And if any events ever proved the wisdom of the steps which a man took, those surely did which clustered about and composed the eventful, if melancholy, history of Stanley’s “Rear Guard” on the Aruwimi. Several correspondents,
some of whom accompanied Stanley on his two up-river journeys, and others who have been over the ground, have written fully of the Aruwimi situation, and their views are valuable, though space forbids more than a condensation of them here.
A fatal river, say they all, was the Aruwimi for Stanley. It was so in 1877. 1883 served to recall regretful memories of his canoe descent, and introduced him to sadder scenes than he had ever occasioned or witnessed. The details of the deserted and blackened camp of his “Rear Guard” on the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition will prove to be more tragic than any which went before. It was close to the confluence of the Aruwimi with the Congo, as narrated elsewhere in this volume, that Stanly was compelled, in 1877, to storm a native village; and, as we have just seen, when he passed the spot again in 1883, what wonder that the dusky warriors reassembled to receive him! Round the bend “where the great affluent gaped into view,” the river was thronged with war-canoes, and on the banks stood the villages of Basongo and Mokulu, where Stanley’s ancient foes resided. In fantastic array appeared long lines of fully armed warriors—a land force supporting the fighting men afloat. How, aided by a picturesque and showy interpreter, with a voice as powerful as his eloquence, Stanley, on this latter occasion, appeased their warlike ardor and made them friends, has just been told in these pages.
The reader will understand, however, from the number of the force against him and the ferocious character of the tribes, why Stanley was so careful when forming his latest camp on the Aruwimi, to have it well stockaded and efficiently sentinelled. The local natives had not only the incentive of their previous defeat by Stanley to keep their hostility alive, but they had had meanwhile some bitter experiences of the Arab raider. They are splendid races of men, the tribes of the Mokulu and the Basoko, picturesque in their yellow war-paint, their barbaric shields and decorative headdresses. They are skilled workmen. Their paddles are beautifully carved, their spears and knives artistic and of dexterous shapeliness. They have also broadswords, and in a general way their weapons are of wonderful temper and sharpness. Now and then the Arab raiders find their work of massacre and plunder a hot business among
such natives as these; but the advantage of the rifle is, of course, tremendous, and can only have one result. The Arabs do not, however, always have it entirely their own way. They leave both dead and wounded sometimes in the hands of the enemy, who frequently condemn both to the pot, and make merry, no doubt, over their grilled remains.
Among the many hardships of the Aruwimi camp, established by Stanley for his “Rear Guard,” on his latest upward trip, and left under Major Barttelot, was the uncontrollable character of the Manyema carriers and escort. These people have for many years been the slave-hunting allies of the Arabs—their jackals, their cheetahs; and the Stanley camp had actually to be spectators of the attack and raiding of a native village, opposite their own quarters, on the other side of the river. It was towards night when the onslaught began. The sudden sound of the warlike drums of the surprised natives came booming across the water, followed by the fierce rattle of the Arab musketry. Dark figures and light were soon mixed together in the fray. The natives fought bravely—but they fell rapidly before the rifle. Pelted with the deadly hail of shot, they were soon vanquished. Then from hut to hut the flames of ruin began to spread, and in the lurid light women and children were marched forth to the slave-hunter’s stockade—some to be ransomed next day by the remainder of the ivory the natives had successfully hidden; others probably to be passed on from hand to hand until they eventually reached a slave-dealing market. And all this the officers and comrades of Mr. Stanley had the humiliation to witness without daring to interfere—not from any fear of losing their lives in the defence of the weaker—a death which has been courted by thousands of brave men on land and sea—but for reasons of policy. They were not there to protect the natives of the Aruwimi from Arab raiders, but to follow Mr. Stanley with the stores necessary for the success of his expedition. Nor is it likely that the force under Major Barttelot would have obeyed him if he had desired to intervene. Mr. Stanley himself more than once in his African experience has had to shut his eyes to Arab aggression and cruelty, although his influence with Tippoo Tib has no doubt paved the way for the realization of his humane ambition in the matter of slavery. From their stockade
and on board their launch at Yambuya, Barttelot and his comrades could see the woefully unequal warfare on the raided village, and there is no need of the assurance that their hearts beat high with indignation and a desire to take a hand in it. Moreover, these lawless brutalities practiced upon the natives made the difficulties of the camp all the greater, not only affecting the dangers of the advance, but increasing the perils of the way to the Falls, as was experienced by Ward on his travels to and fro—his “aimless journeys” Mr. Stanley has called them, but undertaken nevertheless by order of Ward’s superior officer, Major Barttelot.
Whether or not the Arabs of the camp or the Manyuemas had a share in the tragedy on the other side of the river is a question perhaps of no serious moment; but confessions were made to Ward which rather tend to show that the Arabs, while waiting for the expected advance, fulfilled other engagements on the river. “I went to Selim’s camp to-day,” writes Mr. Ward in one of his private letters, “and they told me that two more of their men (Arabs) had been caught and eaten by the natives whose village they had raided and burnt some weeks ago.” The same correspondent again writes: “This morning some of the raiders came down from up-river with news of the defeat of ten of their number, cut to pieces by the natives, who sought refuge in their canoes above the rapids.” Selim and his men started off in pursuit, and returned at night lamenting that they had killed only two of the natives. On the next day he told Ward that where his men had fallen he found their fingers tied in strings to the scrub of the river-bank, and some cooking-pots containing portions of their bones. What a weary time it was waiting, and with only this kind of incident to ruffle the monotony of it—waiting for the promised carriers that did not come—waiting for news of Stanley that only came in suggestions of disaster! It is hardly a matter of surprise that the camp began to fear the worst. Their own experiences of the broken word of Tippoo Tib and the utter unreliability and ferocity of a portion of their force might well give a pessimistic tone to their contemplation of the awful possibilities of Stanley’s march. Every omen of the Aruwimi was unfavorable to success; and they must have been terribly impressed by such a scene as that which cast its murderous light upon the river not
long previously to the forward march, with the assassination of the commander and the eventual dispersion of the rear-guard.