“L’exploitation se fait par les agents de l’Intendance, sous la
direction du Commissaire de District.
“Tout ce qui se rapporte à l’exploitation du domaine privé doit
être séparé nettement des autres services gouvernementaux.
“Les agents préposés à l’exploitation du domaine privé consacrent
tous leurs soins au développement de la récolte du caoutchouc et
des autres produits de la forêt.
“Quel que soit le mode d’exploitation adopté à cet effet, ils sont
tenus d’accorder aux indigènes une rémunération qui ne sera en
aucun cas inférieure au montant du prix de la main-d’œuvre
nécessaire à la récolte du produit; cette rémunération est fixée
par le Commissaire de District, qui soumet son tarif à
l’approbation du Gouverneur-Général.
“L’Inspecteur d’État en mission vérifie si ce tarif est en rapport
avec le prix de la main-d’œuvre; il veille à sa stricte
application, et il examine si les conditions générales
d’exploitation ne donnent lieu à aucune plainte justifiée.
“Il fait comprendre aux agents chargés du service que, par le fait
de rétribuer équitablement l’indigène, ils emploient le seul moyen
efficace d’assurer la bonne administration du domaine et de faire
naître chez lui le goût et l’habitude du travail.”
Both from the condition of the Domaine Privé Store I inspected at P*,
and the obvious poverty and universal discontent of the native
contributors, whose towns I visited during the seventeen days spent in
Lake Mantumba, it was clear that these instructions had long since
ceased to be operative. The responsibility for the non-application of
such necessary regulations could not be attributed to the local
officials, who, obviously, if left without the means of adequate
remuneration could not themselves make good the oversights or omissions
of their superiors. That these omissions form part of a systematic
breach of instructions conceived in the interest of the native I do not
assert, but it was most apparent that neither in Lake Mantumba nor the
other portions of the Domaine Privé which I visited was any adequate
provision made for inculcating the natives with any just appreciation of
the value of work.
The station at Bikoro has been established as a Government plantation
for about ten years. It stands on the actual site of the former native
town of Bikoro, an important Settlement in 1893, now reduced to a
handful of ill-kept, untidy huts, inhabited by only a remnant of its
former expropriated population.
Another small village, Bomenga, stands on the other side of the
Government houses; the plantation enveloping both villages, and
occupying their old cassava fields and gardens, which are now planted
with coffee trees. Further inland these give place to cocoa and
india-rubber trees (_fantumia elastica_), and also to the indigenous
Landolphia creeper, which is being extensively cultivated. The entire
plantation covers 800 hectares. There are 70 kilom. of well-cleared
pathway through it, one of these roads measuring 11 kilom. in almost a
straight line; 400 workmen are employed, consisting in small part of
local natives, but chiefly of men brought from a distance. One numerous
group I saw I was informed were “prisoners” from the Ruki district.
There are 140,000 coffee trees and 170,000 cocoa trees actually in the
ground, the latter a later planting than the coffee. Last year the yield
was: coffee 112 tons, and cocoa 7 tons, all of which, after cleaning and
preparing at the Government depôt at Kinchasa, was shipped to Europe on
the Government account. India-rubber planting was not begun until
November 1901. There are now 248 hectares already under cultivation,
having 700,000 young Landolphia creepers, and elsewhere on the
plantation, on portions mainly given up to coffee growing, there are
50,000 _fantumia elastica_ and 50,000 _manihot glaziovii_ trees. The
station buildings are composed entirely of native materials, and are
erected entirely by local native labour. The Chief of the Post has very
ably directed the work of this plantation, which engrosses all his time,
and until quite recently he had no assistant. A subordinate official is
now placed under his orders. When he took over the district he told me
there were sixty-eight native soldiers attached to the post, which
number he has now been able to reduce to nineteen. In the days when the
india-rubber tax prevailed in Lake Mantumba there were several hundreds
of soldiers required in that region. No rubber is now worked in the
neighbourhood I am informed.
Despite the 70 kilom. of roadway through the plantation, much of which
has to be frequently--indeed daily--traversed, the two Europeans have no
means of locomotion provided them, and must make their daily inspection
to various points of this large plantation on foot.
In addition to the control of this flourishing establishment, the Chief
of the Post is the Executive Chief of the entire district, but it is
evident that but little time or energy could be left to the most
energetic official for duties outside the immediate scope of his work as
a coffee and india-rubber grower, in addition to those “engrossing
cares” the general instructions cited above impose upon the agents who
exploit the State domain.
I have dwelt upon the condition of P* and the towns I visited around
Lake Mantumba in my notes taken at the time, and these are appended
hereto (Inclosure 3).[15] A careful investigation of the conditions of
native life around the lake confirmed the truth of the statements made
to me--that the great decrease in population, the dirty and ill-kept
towns, and the complete absence of goats, sheep, or fowls--once very
plentiful in this country--were to be attributed above all else to the
continued effort made during many years to compel the natives to work
india-rubber. Large bodies of native troops had formerly been quartered
in the district, and the punitive measures undertaken to this end had
endured for a considerable period. During the course of these
operations there had been much loss of life, accompanied, I fear, by a
somewhat general mutilation of the dead, as proof that the soldiers had
done their duty. Each village I visited around the lake, save that of Q*
and one other, had been abandoned by its inhabitants. To some of these
villages the people have only just returned; to others they are only now
returning. In one I found the bare and burnt poles of what had been
dwellings left standing, and at another--that of R*--the people had fled
at the approach of my steamer, and despite the loud cries of my native
guides on board, nothing could induce them to return, and it was
impossible to hold any intercourse with them. At the three succeeding
villages I visited beyond R*, in traversing the lake towards the south,
the inhabitants all fled at the approach of the steamer, and it was only
when they found whose the vessel was that they could be induced to
return.
At one of these villages, S*, after confidence had been restored and the
fugitives had been induced to come in from the surrounding forest, where
they had hidden themselves, I saw women coming back carrying their
babies, their household utensils, and even the food they had hastily
snatched up, up to a late hour of the evening. Meeting some of these
returning women in one of the fields I asked them why they had run away
at my approach, and they said, smiling, “We thought you were Bula
Matadi” (_i.e._, “men of the Government”). Fear of this kind was
formerly unknown on the Upper Congo; and in much more out-of-the-way
places visited many years ago the people flocked from all sides to greet
a white stranger. But to-day the apparition of a white man’s steamer
evidently gave the signal for instant flight.
The chief of the P* post told me that a similar alarm reigned almost
everywhere in the country behind his station, and that when he went on
the most peaceful missions only a few miles from his house the villages
were generally emptied of all human beings when he entered them, and it
was impossible in the majority of cases to get into touch with the
people in their own homes. It was not so in all cases, he said, and he
instanced certain villages where he could go certain of a friendly
reception, but with the majority, he said, he had found it quite
impossible to ever find them “at home.” He gave, as an explanation, when
I asked for the reason of this fear of the white man, that as these
people were great savages, and knew themselves how many crimes they had
committed, they doubtless feared that the white man of the Government
was coming to punish their misconduct. He added that they had
undoubtedly had an “awful past” at the hands of some of the officials
who had preceded him in the local administration, and that it would take
time for confidence to be restored. Men, he said, still came to him
whose hands had been cut off by the Government soldiers during those
evil days, and he said there were still many victims of this species of
mutilation in the surrounding country. Two cases of the kind came to my
actual notice while I was in the lake. One, a young man, both of whose
hands had been beaten off with the butt ends of rifles against a tree,
the other a young lad of 11 or 12 years of age, whose right hand was cut
off at the wrist. This boy described the circumstances of his
mutilation, and, in answer to my inquiry, said that although wounded at
the time he was perfectly sensible of the severing of his wrist, but lay
still fearing that if he moved he would be killed. In both these cases
the Government soldiers had been accompanied by white officers whose
names were given to me. Of six natives (one a girl, three little boys,
one youth, and one old woman) who had been mutilated in this way during
the rubber régime, all except one were dead at the date of my visit. The
old woman had died at the beginning of this year, and her niece
described to me how the act of mutilation in her case had been
accomplished. The day I left Lake Mantumba five men whose hands had been
cut off came to the village of T* across the lake to see me, but hearing
that I had already gone away they returned to their homes. A messenger
came in to tell me, and I sent to T* to find them, but they had then
dispersed. Three of them subsequently returned, but too late for me to
see them. These were some of those, I presume, to whom the official had
referred, for they came from the country in the vicinity of P* station.
Statements of this character, made both by the two mutilated persons I
saw and by others who had witnessed this form of mutilation in the past,
are appended (Inclosure 4).[16]
The taxes levied on the people of the district being returnable each
week or fortnight, it follows that they cannot leave their homes. At
some of the villages I visited near the end of Lake Mantumba the fish
supplies have to be delivered weekly to the military camp at Irebu, or
when the water is high in the lake and fish harder to catch, every ten
days. The distance from Irebu of one of these towns could not have been
less than 45 miles. To go and come between their homes and the camp
involved to the people of this town 90 miles of canoe paddling, and with
the lake stormy and its waters rough--as is often the case--the double
journey would take at least four days. This consumption of time must be
added to that spent in the catching of the fish, and as the punishment
for any falling off in quantity or delay in delivery is not a light one,
the Chief responsible for the tax stoutly opposes any one quitting the
town. Some proof of this incidentally arose during my stay, and
threatened to delay my journey. Being short-handed I sought, when at
Ikoko, to engage six or seven young men of the town as woodcutters to
travel on board the steamer. I proposed to engage them for two or three
months, and offered good wages, much more than by any local service they
could hope to earn. More men offered than I needed, and I selected six.
The State Chief of the village hearing of this at once came to me to
protest against any of his people leaving the town, and said that he
would have all the youths I had engaged tied up and sent over to the
Government official at Bikoro. There were at the time three soldiers
armed with Albini rifles quartered at Ikoko, and the Chief sent for them
to arrest my would-be crew. The Chief’s argument, too, was perfectly
logical. He said, “I am responsible each week for 600 rations of fish
which must be delivered at Bikoro. If it fails I am held responsible and
will be punished. I have been flogged more than once for a failure in
the fish supply, and will not run any risks. If these men go I shall be
short-handed, therefore they must stay to help in getting the weekly
tax.” I was forced to admit the justice of this argument, and we finally
arrived at a compromise. I promised the Chief that, in addition to
paying wages to the men I took, a sum representing the value to him of
their labour should be left at Ikoko, so that he might hire extra hands
to get the full quantity of fish required of him. S I admitted that he
had been forced to flog men from villages which failed in their weekly
supplies, but that he had for some months discontinued this course. He
said that now he put defaulters into prison instead. If a village which
was held to supply, say, 200 rations of fish each week brought only 180
rations, he accepted no excuse, but put two men in “block.” If thirty
rations were wanting he detained three of the men, and so on--a man for
each ten rations. These people would remain prisoners, and would have to
work at Bikoro, or possibly would be sent to Coquilhatville, the
administrative head-quarters of the Equator district, until the full
imposition came in.
I subsequently found when in the neighbourhood of Coquilhatville that
summary arrest and imprisonment of this kind for failure to complete the
tale of local imposition is of constant occurrence. The men thus
arrested are kept often in the “chain gang” along with other prisoners,
and are put to the usual class of penitential work. They are not brought
before or tried by any Court or sentenced to any fixed term of
imprisonment, but are merely detained until some sort of satisfaction is
obtained, and while under detention are kept at hard work.
Indeed, I could not find that a failure to meet the weekly tax is
punishable by law and no law was cited to me as a warrant for this
summary imprisonment, but if such a law exists it is to be presumed that
it does not treat the weekly taxpayers’ failure as a grave criminal
offence. The men taken are frequently not those in fault; the
requisitioning authority cannot discriminate. He is forced to insure
compliance with the demands imposed on each village, and the first men
to hand from the offending community of necessity have to pay in the
chain-gang the general failure and possibly the individual fault of
others. Men taken in this way are sometimes not seen again in their own
homes. They are either taken to distant Government stations as workmen,
or are drafted as soldiers into the Force Publique. The names of many
men thus taken from the Mantumba district were given to me, and in some
cases their relatives had heard of their death in distant parts of the
country. This practice was, I believe, more general in the past, but
that it still exists to-day, and on an extensive scale, I had several
instances of observing in widely separated districts. The officials
effecting these arrests do not seem to have any other course open to
them, unless it be a resort to military punitive measures or to
individual corporal punishment; while the natives assert that, as the
taxes are unequally distributed, and their own numbers constantly
decreasing, the strain upon them each week often becomes unbearable, and
some of their number will shirk the constantly recurring unwelcome task.
Should this shirking become general instead of being confined to
individuals, punitive measures are undertaken against the refractory
community. Where these do not end in fighting, loss of life and
destruction of native property, they entail very heavy fines which are
levied on the defaulting village. An expedition of the minor kind
occurred some five months before my presence in Lake Mantumba. The
village in fault was that of R*, the one where when I sought to visit it
no people would remain to face me. This village was said to have been
some three weeks in arrears with the fish it was required to supply to
the camp at Irebu. An armed force occupied it, commanded by an officer,
and captured ten men and eight canoes. These canoes and the prisoners
were conveyed by water to Irebu, the main force marching back by land.
My informant, who dwelt in a village near R*, which I was then visiting,
said he saw the prisoners being taken back to Irebu under guard of six
black soldiers, tied up with native rope so tightly that they were
calling aloud with pain. The force halted the night in his town. These
people were detained at Irebu for ten days until the people of R* had
brought in a supply of fish and had paid a fine. Upon their release two
of these men died, one close to Irebu and the other within sight of the
village I was in, and two more, my informant added, died soon after
their return to R*. A man, who saw them, said the prisoners were ill and
bore the marks on wrists and legs of the thongs used in tying them. Of
the canoes captured only the old ones were returned to R*, the better
ones being confiscated.
The native relating this incident added that he thought it stupid of the
white men to take both men and canoes away from a small place like R* as
a punishment for a shortage in its fish supply. “The men were wanted to
catch fish and so were the canoes,” he said, “and to take both away only
made it harder for the people of R* to perform their task.” I went to R*
in the hope of being able to verify the truth of this and other
statements made to me as to the hardships recently inflicted on its
people by reason of their disobedience, but owing to their timidity, to
whatever cause this might have been due, it was impossible for me to get
into touch with any of them. That a very close watch is kept on the
people of the district and their movements is undoubted. In the past
they escaped in large numbers to the French territory, but many were
prevented by force from doing this, and numbers were shot in the
attempt.
To-day the Congolese authorities discourage intercourse of this kind,
not by the same severe measures as formerly, but probably none the less
effectively. By a letter dated the 2nd July, 1902, the present
Commandant of the camp of Irebu wrote as follows to the Rev. E. V.
Sjoblom, a Swedish Missionary (since dead), who was then in charge of
the Mission at Ikoko:
“Je vous serais bien obligé de ne pas permettre à vos jeunes gens
de se rendre sur la rive Française et vendre aux indigènes Français
qui ont fui notre rive, des vivres, produits du travail de nos
indigènes, que eux-mêmes n’ont pas fui et ne se sont pas soustraits
au travail que nous leur avons imposé.”
From Lake Mantumba I proceeded to the immediate neighbourhood of
Coquilhatville, where five days were spent, chiefly at native
communities which stretch for some distance along the east bank of the
Congo. These villages formerly extended for 15 miles, and were then
filled with a numerous population. To-day they are broken up into
isolated settlements, each much reduced in numbers, and with (in most
cases) the houses badly constructed. There were no goats or sheep to be
seen, whereas formerly these were very plentiful, and food for the crew
was only obtained with difficulty. In the village of V*, which I twice
visited, the usual tax of food-stuff, with firing for the steamers, had
to be supplied to Coquilhatville, which is distant only some 6 miles. A
Government sentry was quartered here, who, along with one of the Chiefs
of the town, spoke fully of the condition of the people. The sentry
himself came from the Upper Bussira River, some hundreds of miles
distant. This was, he said, his third period of service with the Force
Publique. As his reason for remaining so long in this service he
asserted that, as his own village and country were subjected to much
trouble in connection with the rubber tax, he could not live in his own
home, and preferred, he said, laughing, “to be with the hunters rather
than with the hunted.” Both a Chief V* and this sentry represented the
food taxes levied on this village as difficult for the people to
collect, and only inadequately remunerated. There would appear in all
these statements a contradiction in terms. The contributions required of
the natives are continually spoken of as a “tax,” and are as continually
referred to as being “paid for” or “remunerated.” It is obvious that
taxes are neither bought nor sold, but the contradiction is only one of
terms. The fact is that the weekly or fortnightly contributions
everywhere required of the native communities I visited are levied as
taxes, or “prestations annuelles,” by authority of a Royal Decree of the
Sovereign of the Congo State. The Decrees authorizing the levy of these
taxes are dated the 6th October, 1891 (Article 4), that of the 5th
December, 1892, and (for the district of Manyeuma) that of the 28th
November, 1893. There is a further Decree, dated the 30th April, 1897,
requiring the establishment and up-keep by native Chiefs of coffee and
cocoa plantations. I nowhere saw or heard of such plantations existing
as institutions maintained by the natives themselves. There are
plantations of both existing, but these are the property of either the
Government itself or of some European agency acting with its sanction
and partly in its interests, on lands declared as public lands. With
regard to the two first Decrees establishing a system of taxation,
provision was made for the investiture of a native Chief recognized by
the local Government authority, who should give to this Chief a copy of
the _procès-verbal_, as registered in the public archives, and a medal
or other symbol of office. With this investiture a list was ordered to
be drawn up, indicating the name of the village, its exact situation,
the names of the Headmen, the number of its houses, and the actual
number of the population--men, women, and children. The Decree then goes
on to provide for the manner in which the “prestations annuelles”
imposed on each village were to be assessed. A list of the products to
be furnished by each village--such as maize, sorghum, palm oil,
ground-nuts, &c., corvées of workmen or soldiers--was to be drawn up by
the Commissaire of the district. It was provided that this list should
also indicate the lands which were to be cleared and cultivated under
the direction of the Chiefs, the nature of such cultivation put in hand,
and “all other works of public utility which might be prescribed in the
interest of public health, the exploitation or improvement of the soil,
or otherwise.” These lists had first of all to be submitted for his
approval to the Governor-General. I could not find that, save in respect
of the strict enforcement of the contributions, this law was generally
or rigorously observed. In many villages where I asked for it no copy of
any _procès-verbal_ could be produced, and in several cases no act of
investiture of the local Chief seemed to have ever taken place.
Plantations, such as those outlined in the Decree which made provision
for them, nowhere exist in any part of the country I traversed. The
enumeration of the houses and people had in some instances been made, I
was informed, but it was many years ago; and as the population had since
greatly declined, this enumeration could not to-day always serve as an
accurate basis on which to reckon the extent of the existing
contribution.
At the village of A*, which I visited twice during my stay in the
neighbourhood, A furnished me with particulars as to his own public
obligations. His portion of A* had formerly been extensive, and at the
date when an enumeration was made contained many people. To-day it has
only six adult householders, including himself, inhabiting now eleven
huts in all, with their wives and children--a total population of
twenty-seven persons. My attention was first drawn to him and his
village by my meeting with a young boy--a lad of 7 years old, I should
judge--whom I found in the village of U* as the recently acquired
property of B. B told me he had bought the boy, C, from A for 1,000 rods
(50 fr.). A, he said, having to meet a fine imposed by the
Commissaire-Général for shortage in some of the weeks’ supplies, and
being 1,000 rods short of the amount required, had pawned his nephew C
to him for that sum. This had taken place on the [blank space in text],
and my interview with B and the boy took place on the [blank space in
text]. The next day I walked to A*, which lies within a few miles of
Coquilhatville, and saw A and his town and people. There were then
exactly eight men in the town, including himself; but as two have since
been detained as prisoners at Coquilhatville for deficiencies in the
weekly supplies, there were, when I last saw A* in September, only six
adult males there. The weekly imposition levied on A’s part of A* was--
Kwanga 150 rations (about 700 lbs. weight of food).
Fish 95 rations.
Palm thatching mats 900
Firewood, for steamer fuel 2 canoe loads.
Also each week one large fresh fish or, in lieu thereof, two fowls for
the European table at Coquilhatville. In addition, the men had to help
in hunting game in the woods for the European station staff.
The payments made each week for these supplies (when they were
completely delivered) were:--
Fr. c.
Kwanga, 150 rods 7 50
Fish, 95 rods 4 75
Palm mats, 180 rods 9 0
2 canoe loads firewood, 1 rod 0 5
------
21 30
Payments for firewood were made by a paper receipt to be redeemed
annually, but A told me he had refused to accept the annual payment of
50 rods (2 fr. 50 c.) for 104 canoe loads of wood delivered during the
twelve months. To obtain these supplies A had frequently to purchase
both fish and palm mats. The fish, as a rule, cost from 10 to 20 rods
per ration, and the market price of thatching mats is 1 rod each; while
the kwanga, which the Government paid 1 rod for, fetched just 5 rods
each in the open market. The value of A’s weekly contribution was,
according to current prices, as follows:--
----------------------------------------+---------+-----------------
| Rods. | Value.
+---------+----------
| | Fr. c.
150 rations, kwanga, each 5 rods | 750 | 37 50
95 “ fish, each 10 rods | 950 | 47 50
900 palm mats, each 1 rod | 900 | 45 0
2 canoe loads firewood, each 20 rods | 40 | 2 0
+---------+----------
Total | | 132 0
----------------------------------------+---------+-----------------
Thus, taking no account of the fresh fish or fowls, A’s small township
of eight households lost 110 fr. 70 c. per week. At the year’s end,
while they had contributed 6,864 fr. worth of food and material to the
local Government station, they had received as recompense 1,107 fr. 60
c. A, personally, had a larger share of the tax to meet than any of the
others, and I found that the value of his personal contribution reached
80_l._ 3_s._ 4_d._ per annum by local prices, while he received in
settlement 9_l._ 15_s._ in Government payments. He therefore contributed
on his household of two wives, his mother, and dependents, inhabiting
three grass and cane huts, an amount equal to 70_l._ 8_s._ 4_d._ per
annum net.
These figures, I found on inquiry, were confirmed as correct by those
who were acquainted with the local conditions. A stated that his elder
brother, D, was in reality Chief of the township, but that some eight
months previously D had been arrested for a deficiency in the fish and
kwanga supplies. The Commissaire had then imposed a fine of 5,000 rods
(250 fr.) on the town, which A, with the assistance of a neighbouring
Chief named C, had paid. D was not thereupon at once released, and soon
afterwards escaped from the prison at Coquilhatville, and remained in
hiding in the forest. Soldiers came from the Government station and tied
up eight women in the town. A and all the men ran away upon their
coming, but he himself returned in the morning. The Commissaire-Général
visited A*, and told A that as D had run away he (A) was now the
recognized Chief of the town. He was then ordered to find his fugitive
brother, whose whereabouts he did not know, and a town in the
neighbourhood name E, suspected of harbouring him, was fined 5,000 rods.
Since that date, although D had returned to A* to reside, A had been
held, against his will, as responsible Chief of the town. He was a young
man of about 23 or 24 years of age I should say. He had repeatedly, he
stated, begged to be relieved of the honour thrust upon him, but in
vain. His brother, D, had recently been put again in prison at
Coquilhatville in connection with the loss of two cap-guns furnished him
when Chief in order to procure game for the local white men’s table. The
present impositions laid on A* were, A asserted, much more than it was
possible for him to meet. He had repeatedly appealed to the
Commissaire-Général and other officers at Coquilhatville, including the
law officer, begging them to visit his town and see for themselves--as I
might see--that he was speaking the truth. But, so far, no one would
listen to him, and he had been always rebuffed. On the last occasion of
his making this appeal, only three days before I saw him, he had been
threatened with prompt imprisonment if he failed in his supplies, and he
said he now saw no course before him but flight or imprisonment. He
could not run away, he said, and leave his mother and dependents;
besides, he would be surely found, and, in any case, whatever town
harboured him would be fined as E had been.
On a certain Sunday, when he had gone in with the usual weekly supplies,
which are returnable on Sundays, he had been short of eight rations of
fish and ten rations of kwanga and 330 palm mats, representing a value
of 84 rods (4 fr. 20 c.), as estimated on the scale of Government
payments. On the same date the other and larger portion of A* town was
also short of its tale of supplies, and a fine of 5,000 brass rods (250
fr.) was imposed upon the collective village. A’s share of this fine
was fixed by the natives among themselves at 2,000 rods, of which 1,000
rods were to be his own personal contribution. Having himself now no
money and no other means of obtaining it, he had pledged--with the
consent of the father--his little nephew, D’s son, whom I had seen with
B. In making inquiry, A’s story received much confirmation. He was, at
any rate, known as a man of very good character, and everything pointed
to his statement being true. On my return down river, I again saw A, who
came after nightfall to see me, in the hope that I might perhaps be able
to help him. He said that, since I had left a month previously, two of
the boys of his town had been detained at Coquilhatville as prisoners
when taking the rations on two successive weeks, owing to a deficiency
on each occasion of 18 rods in value (90 cents.), and that these two
boys--whose names he gave me--were still in prison. He had been that
very day, he said, to beg that they might be released, but had failed,
and there were now only five adult males in his village, including
himself.
While in Coquilhatville on this mission, he declared that he had seen
eleven men brought in from villages in the neighbourhood, who were put
in prison before him--all of them on account of a shortage in the
officially fixed scale of supplies required from their districts. I
offered to take him away with me in order to lay his case before the
judicial authorities elsewhere, but he refused to leave his mother. That
A’s statements were not so untrustworthy as on the face they might seem
to be, was proved a few days later by a comparison of his case with that
of another village I visited. This was a town named W*, lying some three
miles inland in a swampy forest situated near the mouth of the X* River.
On quitting Coquilhatville, I proceeded to the mouth of this river,
which enters the Congo some forty-five miles above that station, and I
remained two days in that neighbourhood. Learning that the people of the
immediate neighbourhood had recently been heavily fined for failure in
their food supplies, which have to be delivered weekly at that station,
and that these fines had fallen with especial severity on W*, I decided
to visit that town.
It was on the 21st August that I visited W*, where I found that the
statements made to me were borne out by my personal observation. The
town consisted of a long single street of native huts lying in the midst
of a clearing in the forest. In traversing it from end to end I
estimated the number of its people at about 600 all told.
At the upper end of the town a number of men and women assembled, and
some came forward, when they made a lengthy statement to the following
effect. From this upper end of the town wherein I was 100 rations of
kwanga had to be supplied weekly, and thirty fowls at a longer interval.
These latter were for the use of Coquilhatville, while the kwanga was
very largely for the use of the wood-cutters at the nearest Government
wood-cutting post on the main river. The usual prices for these
articles, viz., for the kwanga, 1 rod each, and for the fowls 20 rods
were paid. The people also had to take each week 10 fathoms of firewood
to the local wood-post, for which they often got no payment, and their
women were required twice a week to work at the Government coffee
plantation which extends around the wood-post.
I saw some bundles of firewood being got ready for carriage to this
place. They were large and very heavy, weighing, I should say, from 70
to 80 lb. each. Some months earlier, at the beginning of the year,
owing, as they said, to their failure to send in the fowls to
Coquilhatville, an armed expedition of some thirty soldiers, commanded
by a European officer, had come thence and occupied their town. At first
they had fled into the forest, but were persuaded to come in. On
returning, many of them--the principal men--- were at once tied up to
trees. The officer informed them that as they had failed in their duty
they must be punished. He required first that twenty-five men should be
furnished as workmen for Government service. These men were taken away
to serve the Government as labourers, and those addressing me did not
know where these men now were. They gave eighteen names of men so taken,
and said that the remaining seven came from the lower end of the town
through which I had passed on entering, where the relatives themselves
could give me particulars if I wished. The twenty-five men had not since
been seen in W*, nor had any one there cognizance of their whereabouts.
The officer had then imposed as further punishment a fine of 55,000
brass rods (2,750 fr.)--110_l._ This sum they had been forced to pay,
and as they had no other means of raising so large a sum they had, many
of them, been compelled to sell their children and their wives. I saw no
live-stock of any kind in W* save a very few fowls--possibly under a
dozen--and it seemed, indeed, not unlikely that, as these people
asserted, they had great difficulty in always getting their supplies
ready. A father and mother stepped out and said that they had been
forced to sell their son, a little boy called F, for 1,000 rods to meet
their share of the fine. A widow came and declared that she had been
forced, in order to meet her share of the fine, to sell her daughter G,
a little girl whom I judged from her description to be about 10 years of
age. She had been sold to a man in Y*, who was named, for 1,000 rods,
which had then gone to make up the fine.
A man named H stated that while the town was occupied by the soldiers, a
woman who belonged to his household, named I, had been shot dead by one
of the soldiers. Her husband, a man named K, stepped forward and
confirmed the statement. They both declared that the woman had quitted
her husband’s house to obey a call of Nature, and that one of the
soldiers, thinking she was going to run away, had shot her through the
head. The soldier was put under arrest by the officer, and they said
they saw him taken away a prisoner when the force was withdrawn from
their town, but they knew nothing more than this. They did not know if
he had been tried or punished. No one of them had ever been summoned to
appear, no question had been addressed to them, and neither had the
husband nor the head of I’s household received any compensation for her
death. Another woman named L, the wife of a man named M, had been taken
away by the native sergeant who was with the soldiers. He had admired
her, and so took her back with him to Coquilhatville. Her husband heard
she had died there of small-pox, but he did not know anything certain of
her circumstances after she had been taken away from W*. A man named N
said he had sold his wife O to a man in Y* for 900 rods to meet his
share of the fine.
It was impossible for me to verify these statements, or to do much
beyond noting down, as carefully as possible, the various declarations
made. I found, however, on returning to Y*, that the statements made
with regard to the little boy F and the girl G were true. These children
were both in the neighbourhood, and owing to my intervention F was
restored to his parents. The girl G, I was told, had again changed
hands, and was promised in sale to a town on the north bank of the
Congo, named Iberi, whose people are said to be still open cannibals.
Through the hands of the local missionary this transfer was prevented,
and I paid the 1,000 rods to her original purchaser, and left G to be
restored to her mother from the Mission. I saw her there on the 9th
September, after she had been recovered through this missionary’s
efforts, while about to be sent to her parent.
With regard to the quantity of food supplies levied upon W*, I did not
obtain the total amount required of the entire community, but only that
which the upper end of the town furnished. The day of my visit happened
to be just that when the kwanga, due at the local wood-post, was being
prepared for delivery on the morrow. I saw many of the people getting
their shares ready. Each share of kwanga, for which a payment of 1 rod
is made by the Government, consisted of five rolls of this food tied
together. One of these bundles of five rolls I sought to buy, offering
the man carrying it 10 rods--or ten times what he was about to receive
for it from the local Government post. He refused my offer, saying that,
although he would like the 10 rods, he dare not be a bundle of his
ration short. One of these bundles was weighed and found to weigh over
15 lb. This may have been an extraordinarily large bundle, although I
saw many others which appeared to be of the same size. I think it would
be safe to assume that the average of each ration of kwanga required
from this town was not less than 12 lb. weight of cooked and carefully
prepared food--a not ungenerous offering for 1/2_d._ By this computation
the portion of W* I visited sends in weekly 1,200 lb. weight of food at
a remuneration of some 5 fr. Cooked bread-stuffs supplied at 9 or 10 fr.
per ton represent, it must be admitted, a phenomenally cheap loaf. At
the same time with this kwanga, being prepared for the Government use, I
saw others being made up for general public consumption. I bought some
of these, which were going to the local market, at their current market
value, viz., 1 rod each. On weighing them I found they gave an average
of 1 lb. each. The weight of food-stuffs required by the Government from
this town would seem to have exceeded in weight twelve times that made
up for public consumption.
Whilst I was in Y* a fresh fine of 20,000 rods (1,000 fr.) was in course
of collection among the various households along the river bank. This
fine had been quite recently imposed by direction of ---- for a further
failure on the part of the Y* towns in the supply of food-stuffs from
that neighbourhood. I saw at several houses piles of brass rods being
collected to meet it, and in front of one of these houses I counted
2,700 rods which had been brought together by the various dependents of
that family; 6,000 rods of this further fine was, I was told, to be
paid by W*, which had not then recovered from its previous much larger
contribution. The W* men begged me to intervene, if I could at all help
them to escape this further imposition. One of them--a strong, indeed a
splendid-looking man--broke down and wept, saying that their lives were
useless to them, and that they knew of no means of escape from the
troubles which were gathering around them. I could only assure these
people that their obvious course to obtain relief was by appeal to their
own constituted authorities, and that if their circumstances were
clearly understood by those responsible for these fines, I trusted and
believed some satisfaction would be forthcoming.
These fines, it should be borne in mind, are illegally imposed: they are
not “fines of Court”; are not pronounced after any judicial hearing, or
for any proved offence against the law, but are quite arbitrarily levied
according to the whim or ill-will of the executive officers of the
district, and their collection, as well as their imposition, involves
continuous breaches of the Congolese laws. They do not, moreover, figure
in the account of public revenues in the Congo “Budgets;” they are not
paid into the public purse of the country, but are spent on the needs of
the station or military camp of the officer imposing them, just as seems
good to this official.
I can nowhere learn upon what legal basis, if any, the punishments
inflicted upon native communities or individuals for failure to comply
with the various forms of “prestations” rest.
These punishments are well-nigh universal and take many shapes, from
punitive expeditions carried out on a large scale to such simpler forms
of fine and imprisonment as that lately inflicted on U*.
I cannot find in the Penal Code of the Congo Statute Book that a failure
to meet or a non-compliance with any form of prestation or _impôt_ is
anywhere defined as a crime; and so far as I can see no legal sanction
could be cited for any one of the punishments so often inflicted upon
native communities for this failure.
By a Royal Decree of the 11th August, 1886, provision was made for the
punishments to be inflicted for infractions of the law not punishable by
special penalties.
Since no special penalty in law would seem to have been provided for
cases of failure or refusal to comply with the demands of the
tax-gatherer, it would seem to be in the terms of this Decree that the
necessary legal sanctions could alone lie.
But this Decree provides for all otherwise unspecified offences far
other punishments, and far other modes of inflicting them than so many
of those which came to my notice during my brief journey.