We paddled along until we came to a tree under which the spirit called Mbuiri was supposed to rest sometimes and look at the river. The men danced and sang under it.
Then we continued our way upon the silent river—lined all along with the dense forest. We saw two huge black and yellow snakes in the water. Afterwards we met a troop of monkeys which from a tree were looking towards the other side of the river. They were chattering among themselves in great earnest. They wanted, I thought, to cross to the other side—but the river was too wide. When we came near them they stopped chattering, and looked down upon us as we passed. When far enough away we heard them chattering again.
Further up we landed near a large tree, where I saw a path. We partook of a light meal, and then, making our canoes secure among the reeds that hid them from sight, we started. This path led to the plantation of the two men who had brought the news of the nginas. The dogs were led by leashes, for we did not want them to run in the forest.
As we marched in single file, not one of us spoke a word. Two or three times we heard troops of monkeys travelling in the forest. Once we heard the shrill cries of a flock of parrots. Suddenly we came upon a great number of pineapple plants; many of the pine-apples had been eaten up. Oshoria looked at me and said: “Nginas have been here,—not to-day, but two or three days ago.”
We continued our way and discovered in a muddy part of the path four footprints of nginas. Their heel-prints were deep in the mud—but the toe-prints were hardly visible. Two of the heels were much larger than the other two. “The big footprints are those of a man ngina,” said Oshoria; “the smaller ones are those of his wife.” When looking round I saw two tiny footprints and pointed them out to Oshoria who said: “Those are the footprints of the baby ngina.”
Further on we saw along the path a place where the nginas had tarried, for the jungle was much broken, and some of the saplings had been broken and partly chewed or eaten up. This looked as if it had been done the day before. We all agreed that the nginas were in the neighborhood.
We slept in the forest that night. Before daylight we were up. I painted my face and hands black with powdered charcoal mixed with oil so that I might not be easily seen. Men from the plantation, who had come to meet us, took charge of the dogs.
After two hours’ walk we stopped, and one of the guides said something to Oshoria in a very low voice which I could not hear. Then Oshoria said: “We had better loose the dogs and let them go.” In the twinkling of an eye they were in the forest and out of sight.
We entered a large field of plantain trees. Oshoria led, I followed, then came Ngola, Ogoola, and then Quabi. We walked very silently, and our excitement was so great that we could hear each other pant. After a while Oshoria was quite a distance ahead of all of us. He was the scout, and we had lost sight of him through the crookedness of the path. I stopped to see if we were all at hand and then we continued our way, when, after passing a bend in the path, I saw Oshoria standing still waiting for us. As soon as he saw us he gave the cluck of danger, “Kluk, kluk,” put his hand on his mouth as a sign not to speak, then his hand towards his ear as a sign for us to listen. We walked towards him without uttering a word, but looked towards each other. Then Oshoria pointed with his finger in a certain direction. He had evidently heard something that had attracted his attention there.
Soon we heard the peculiar shrill piercing cry of fear of a ngina. Oshoria whispered to me: “That is the cry of a female gorilla who is afraid and has fled. Probably she has scented the dogs and given the cry of distrust and fear to her mate.”