family is found here, smoke dried and sold for food and is very good
eating indeed.

Two of the crew were _chicotted_. to-day by order of the captain. One had
attacked another boy with a knife and wounded him and the other had
stolen, and then falsely blamed another. The _chicotte_ is a plain
strip of hippo hide and the punishment was administered publicly by the
capita on the bridge of the steamer and did not appear to be more
painful than an ordinary birching at a public school.

At 10 p.m. we decide to take the big iron boat of the steamer and go
hunting. The natives are exceedingly skilful and know all the likely
places for hippo. They first paddle hard up stream and having arrived at
the hunting ground allow the boat to drift down with the current in
perfect silence. It is clear moonlight, but it is necessary to cover the
fore sight of the rifle with white paper in order to see it clearly.
After a time, up rises a great head with a great pant and there is just
time for a shot before it sinks again. Hippos frequent shallow water and
are indifferent swimmers. They walk about on the bottom and rise at
intervals to breathe. It is thus impossible to know in which direction a
beast will next appear or whether he will come up under the boat and
capsize it. This night there were great numbers and we had excellent
sport. One shot in the head is sufficient to kill a hippo which then
sinks and the body does not rise again for some hours. One unfortunate
animal was however, shot in the back and rearing straight up on his hind
legs rushed for some yards in that attitude until a second shot in the
head put him out of his misery.

Next day we reach Lukolela, a Wood Post and telegraph station. The line
runs along the bank all the way from Leopoldville to Coquilhatville and