After two hundred and forty miles the trend was to the northwest, whither, week after week, for about three hundred miles it kept its puzzling flow toward a point of the compass where it could join no river known to man. It had, too, assumed proportions and volume truly Amazonic, filled with islands and swollen from one to seven miles in width. All efforts to gain a knowledge of its final course were then fruitless, for the few barbarous natives they could win to speech answered in uncouth jargon, scarcely intelligible to the interpreters: "It is the river--the river!" The terrors of the silent stream in its majestic solitude were almost preferable to the presence of populous villages, which here and there lined its banks, for the inhabitants, ferociously hostile for the greater part, refused trade and boldly assaulted them. Skilful canoemen and good archers, the savages slaughtered unwary stragglers, harassed the rear and attacked the front, while their horrible threats that the bodies of the slain should serve as food at their cannibalistic repasts instilled terror in the minds of many of Stanley's followers. Skirmishes were frequent, and now and then a severe fight which taxed Stanley's forces to the utmost. Again the river had here and there series of cataracts which caused no end of trouble, delay, and danger to the party, nine men being drowned in one day. Fortunately the river had turned to the south, and then to southwest, where, after another thousand miles, it flowed through a narrow gorge, one hundred and fifty miles from the sea, so that no doubt longer obtained as to it being the Congo. The terrible falls near the gorge entailed enormous labor to pass them, and barely failed of destroying the party. In all twenty-eight cataracts were passed, and finally the river became so precipitous, the falls so high, that they had to abandon their boats and march overland to Boma, an English trading-post, five days' journey distant. Fatigue, famine, and exposure further enfeebled them and now made daily inroads among the ranks of those who had so far survived, and the entire party would have perished on the very threshold of civilization and plenty had not Stanley's messengers, sent on with urgent appeals, obtained help at Boma, where the expeditionary force arrived August 12, 1877. They had made a river journey of seven thousand miles, proved the Congo to be second only to the Nile, and crossed Africa.