n slaves dug at the malachite mines of Katanga for three
months, and gained a hundred frasilahs of copper, or 3500 lbs. We hear
of a half-caste reaching the other side of Lomame, probably from Congo
or Ambriz, but the messengers had not seen him.

_1st May, 1871._--Katomba's people arrived from the Babisa, where they
sold all their copper at two rings for a tusk, and then found that
abundance of ivory still remained: door-posts and house-pillars had been
made of ivory which now was rotten. The people of Babisa kill elephants
now and bring tusks by the dozen, till the traders get so many that in
this case they carried them by three relays. They dress their hair like
the Bashukulompo, plaited into upright basket helmets: no quarrel
occurred, and great kindness was shown to the strangers. A river having
very black water, the Nyengere, flows into Lualaba from the west, and it
becomes itself very large: another river or water, Shamikwa, falls into
it from the south-west, and it becomes still larger: this is probably
the Lomame. A short-horned antelope is common.

_3rd May, 1871._--Abed informs me that a canoe will come in five days.
Word was sent after me by the traders south of us not to aid me, as I
was sure to die where I was going: the wish is father to the thought!
Abed was naturally very anxious to get first into the Babisa ivory
market, yet he tried to secure a canoe for me before he went, but he was
too eager, and a Manyuema man took advantage of his desire, and came
over the river and said that he had one hollowed out, and he wanted
goats and beads to hire people to drag it down to the water. Abed on my
account advanced five goats, a thousand cowries, and many beads, and
said that he would tell me what he wished in return: this was debt, but
I was so anxious to get away I was content to take the canoe on any
terms. However, it turned out that the matter on the part of the headman
whom Abed trusted was all deception: he had no canoe at all, but knew of
one belonging to another man, and wished to get Abed and me to send men
to see it--in fact, to go with their guns, and he would manage to
embroil them with the real owner, so that some old feud should be
settled to his satisfaction. On finding that I declined to be led into
his trap, he took a female slave to the owner, and on his refusal to
sell the canoe for her, it came out that he had adopted a system of
fraud to Abed. He had victimized Abed, who was naturally incl