I knew he was an ardent collector of birds and reptiles and insects, but I did not know that it was a mania with him. He would slay every bird in Africa; he would collect ugly reptiles, and every hideous insect; he would gather every skull until we should become a travelling museum and cemetery, if only carriers could be obtained. But then his people were already developing those rabid ulcers, syphilis had weakened their constitutions, a puncture of a thorn in the face grew into a horrid and sloughy sore; they had pastured on vice and were reaping the consequences. The camps soon became so filthy that they would breed a pestilence, and we should soon become a moving sight to gods and men. Carriers were dying--they were not well treated--and then, why then, we could not move at all by-and-by. He was in Heaven when his secretary, Rajab Effendi, brought him new species; he looked grateful when there was to be a two days’ rest, sad when he heard we should march; and when we should reach a nice place near Ruwenzori, we should stay a week, oh, splendid! Now, all this made me feel as if we were engaged in a most ungrateful task. As long as life lasts, he will hold me in aversion, and his friends, the Felkins, the Junkers, and Schweinfurths will listen to querulous complaints, but they will never reflect that work in this world must not consist entirely of the storage in museums of skulls, and birds, and insects; that the continent of Africa was never meant by the all-bounteous Creator to be merely a botanical reserve, or an entomological museum. Every man I saw, giant or dwarf, only deepened the belief that Africa had other claims on man, and every feature of the glorious land only impressed me the more that there was a crying need for immediate relief and assistance from civilisation; that first of all, roads of iron must be built, and that fire and water were essential agencies for transport, more especially on this long-troubled continent than on any other.