Stanley remained at Leopoldville for some time, rectifying mischiefs which had occurred at Vivi and Manyanga, and dispatching men and supplies up to Bolobo. Here incidents crowded upon him. Having commissioned a young continental officer to establish a station on the opposite side of the river, the fellow no sooner arrived on the ground than he developed a homicidal mania and shot one of his own sergeants. He was brought back in a tattered and dazed condition and dismissed down the river. Word came of the destruction of a canoe by a gale near the mouth of the Kwa, and the drowning of Lieut. Jansen and twelve people, among whom was Abbé Guyot, the Catholic priest above mentioned. From Kimpoko station came word that a quarrel had broken out there with the natives and that relief must be had. A visit showed the station to have been deserted, and it was destroyed and abandoned. More and more awful grew the situation. A canoe courier brought the harrowing word that Bolobo had been burned, with all the freshly dispatched goods. This news spurred Stanley to a hasty start for the ill-fated station on August 22d. Arriving opposite Bolobo, Stanley’s rear steamers were fired upon from an ambush on the shore, and forced to administer a return fire. His steamers had never been fired upon before. He effected a landing at Bolobo, only to find a majority of the villages hostile to him, and bent on keeping up a desultory fire from the bush. So, unloading one of the steamers, he sent it back to Leopoldville to bring up quickly a Krupp cannon and ammunition. Despite his endeavors to bring about a better feeling, Stanley’s men were fired upon daily, and they returned it as best they could, occasionally killing a native, and doing damage to their banana trees, beer pots and chicken coups. At length the wounding of a chief brought about a parley and offers of peace tokens, but Stanley replied that since they seemed to be so fond of fighting, and were not doing him any particular harm, he proposed to keep it up from day to day till his monster gun arrived from Stanley Pool, when he would blow them all sky-high. This awful threat was too much for them. A nine days’ palaver ensued, which resulted in their payment of a fine and renewed peace. But when the great gun arrived, they saw, in the absence of trigger, stock and ramrod, so little likeness to a gun, that they claimed Stanley had deceived them, and refused to be propitiated till he proved it to be what he had represented. The Congo at Bolobo is 4,000 yards wide. Stanley ordered the cannon to be fired at a range of 2,000 yards, and when they saw a column of water thrown up by the striking of the charge at that distance, and witnessed the recoil of the piece, they began to think it was indeed a terrible weapon. They were still further convinced of the truth of his representations by a second shot, which carried the charge to a distance of 3,000 yards.