thirty days before I saw the mouth of the big river. We anchored off the seat of the government. But my work would not begin till some two hundred miles farther on. So as soon as I could I made a start for a place thirty miles higher up.

“I had my passage on a little sea-going steamer. Her captain was a Swede, and knowing me for a seaman, invited me on the bridge. He was a young man, lean, fair, and morose, with lanky hair and a shuffling gait.

As we left the miserable little wharf, he tossed his head contemptuously at the shore. 'Been living there?” he asked. I said, 'Yes.” 'Fine lot these government chaps — are they not?” he went on, speaking English with great precision and considerable bitterness. 'It is funny what some people will do for a few francs a