The _Peace_ was spasmodic. She steamed well for a short time, then suddenly slackened speed. We waited half an hour for another spurt. Her boiler was a system of coiled tubes, and her propellers were enclosed in twin cylindrical shells under the stern, and required to be driven at a furious rate before any speed could be obtained. She will probably give us great trouble. As soon as we camped, which we generally did about 5 P.M., each officer mustered his men, for wood cutting for the morrow's fuel. This was sometimes very hard work, and continued for hours into the night. The wood of dead trees required to be sought by a number of men and conveyed to the landing-place for the cutters. For such a steamer as the _Stanley_ it would require fifty men to search for and carry wood for quite two hours; it would require a dozen axemen to cut it up into 30-inch lengths for the grates. The _Peace_ and _Henry Reed_ required half as many axes and an equal amount of time to prepare their fuel. It must then be stored on board the steamers that no delay might take place in the morning, and this required some more work before silence, which befits the night, could be obtained, and in the meantime the fires were blazing to afford light, and the noise of crashing, cutting, and splitting of logs continued merrily. The good-for-nothing _Peace_ continued to provoke us on the 4th May. She was certainly one of the slowest steamers any shipbuilder could build. We halted every forty-five minutes or so to "oil up," and sometimes had to halt to clear out the cylinders of the propellers, had to stop to raise steam, to have the grate cleared out of charcoal, while five minutes after raising steam up to 60°, she fell to 40°, and then 35°, and the poor miserable thing floated down stream at the rate of a knot an hour. We lost seven days at Stanley Pool through her; a day was lost when the rudder broke; we were fated to be belated. The next day, the 5th, we made fast to the landing-place of Mswata. The Major and Dr. Parke had arrived four days previously. They had prepared quantities of fuel, and had purchased a large pile of provisions--loaves of bread from the manioc root and Indian corn. On the 6th the Major and his companions received orders to march their men to Kwamouth, and await the steamer. The _Stanley_ was ordered to proceed to Bolobo, debark her passengers, and descend to Kwamouth to convey Barttelot and men, while we reorganized companies at Bolobo.