Major Hans Schomburgk
The leader and organiser of the expedition. During the last sixteen years he has only spent about two years outside Africa.
Our object was to film scenes and plays of native life amongst absolutely virgin and unspoiled surroundings, and to this end we intended to penetrate to the extremest northern confines of Togo, as far at least as the borders of the French Sudan. As I have already intimated, no white woman had ever travelled so far afield in this part of Africa before, but we anticipated little difficulty or danger on this account, the natives being reported as quite friendly everywhere along our proposed line of route. Then, too, His Highness the Duke of Mecklenburg, the governor of the colony, had very kindly instructed all district commissioners and other Government officials to render the expedition every assistance in their power; so that altogether we looked forward to a pleasant, if possibly a somewhat strenuous trip.
The first stage of our journey was to a place called Sokode, seven days' march, and up to this point there is a very fair road. Consequently we had arranged to cycle so far, the major explaining that we should have all the horseback riding we wanted later on.
Our first day's trek was to have been a very short one, only seven miles, and so we did not start until four o'clock in the afternoon, having sent on our carriers and instructed them where to wait for us. But once again we had experience of the curious perversity of the African native. Instead of covering a short seven-mile stage, as ordered, they travelled a good fifteen before they condescended to call a halt.
As a result darkness overtook us long before we overtook them, and I had one or two rather nasty spills, reaching camp at last sore, shaken, and bruised. Schomburgk was furious, but was obliged to dissemble a good deal, as at this stage of the journey, with the carriers comparatively close to their homes, any undue show of harshness or temper might easily have resulted in stampeding the whole lot of them.
That night I spent on a camp bed in an old deserted straw hut. It was not altogether uncomfortable, but I got little sleep. The carriers were all round me in groups of messes, each with its own little fire, and they were all the time mumbling and talking to one another.
The next day we made a short march, as the rest-house was only about eight miles ahead. These rest-houses are strung out all along the Kamina-Sokode road at distances about twenty miles apart, and each marks the end of a stage. Our operator, Hodgson, should have picked us up here. He had left Kamina the day after our departure, intending to overtake us, but he passed us somehow, and cycled on to the next rest-house.
Naturally we wondered what on earth had become of him, and were beginning to get rather anxious when, about four o'clock in the afternoon, a messenger arrived with news of his whereabouts, and bearing a letter asking urgently for a supply of provisions to be sent on to him, as he had nothing to eat where he was, and had tasted no food all that day.
