CANNIBALISM ON THE CONGO.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1819, 18 June 1897, Page 6

CANNIBALISM ON THE CONGO.

A GHASTLY STORY. For a considerable time past it has been known that the administration of the Congo Free State has been most unsatisfactory. The murder of Mr Stokes, the atrocities committed on the Natives (both men and women) by some of the younger Belgian officials, have aroused general indignation, and the State has been warned that the Powers of Europe, which created it, can also unmake it. The stoiy told by Captain S. L. Hinde, to which the attention of Parliament ha« been called, and es-pacially the revelations concerning cannibalism, have shocked the public mind. Captain Hinde deals with tho war between the Free State forces and the Arabs in the Upper Congo regions in the years 1892-93. Baron Dhanis (who is now at the head of another army operating in the Upper Nile region) was in command; and the charge brought against the Baron and his officers is that, while they destroyed the Arab civilisation and put nothing in its place, they directly or indirectly encouraged the horrible practice of cannibalism. Let us see what Captain Hinde says on this point. In the first place, it is abundantly clear that cannibalism was terribly prevalent, but that under the immediate command of the white officers drastic steps were taken to prevent the eating of human flesh, as is instanced by the shooting of a chitf found with a bag slung round his neck containing an arm and leg of a young child. Baron Dhanis was, however, accompanied by a large force of allies under a half-caste Arab named Congo, and it was largely owing to the aid of this man that Tippoo Tib's followers were defeated (with a total loss, as estimated by Captain Hinde, of 70,000 men). Writing of the capture of an Arab fort early in the campaign, Captain Hinde says: —" It was hero that the cannibal propensities of our friendlies and camp followers were first brought before me. On returning through the town after following the inhabitants a mile or two beyond, I found that the killed and wounded had all disappeared, and some of my men volunteered the information that the friendlies had cut them up and carried them off for food. This.l did not believe. On our way home, however, we were again attacked. The friendlies, who were dancing along in front, 'promptly broke and fled, leaving, amongst the other loot scattered about the road, several human arms, legs, and heads, whi«h. the men whose information I had doubted took care to point out to me as a.proof that they had not lied." A little later thfc captain says explicitly : " The fact that both sides were cannibals, or rather that both sides had cannibals in their train, proved a great element in our success," and for the following reason : ".The teaching of the Mahomedau religion does not allow .that a man whose body has been mutilated can enter into the highest heaven, where only perfect men are admitted, As a consequence of this belief, the white Arabs and other faithful followers - of, Islam would, after a rebuff, instead of trying to retrieve the fortunes of the day r fly from the field with all possible so much in order to save their lives as through fear lest their carcasses, in the event of their falling, should be torn to pieces." On the day after the capture of Nyangwe the whole force were sent out to bury the dead, or rather to throw' them into the river, "it being impossible to geal. otherwise with them":— " Matters were, however, simplified for us, since only a few hundred heads were to be found, all the bodies having been carried off for food. . . . For three days we

saw nothing of Lutete, and I learned afterwards, when talking over affairs with him, that during this time he had not left his own quarters; the sights in his camp were so appalling that even he did not care to put himself in the way of seeing them unnecessarily. He told us that every one of the cannibals who accompanied him had at least one bo.ly to eat. All the meat was cooked and smoke-dried, and formed provivisiona for the whole of his force and for all the camp followers for many days afterwards."

As Captain Hiude somewhat naively points out, "they"—the whites —"reaped the only advantages that could be claimed for this disgusting custom. " These human wolves"—the captain is referring to the euormous crowds of camp-followers belonging to their army—by eating np the dead after a battle "saved us, no doubt, from many an epidemic;" , It is pretty plain that, while amongst the enlisted soldiers cannibalism was prohibited, nothing whatever was done to prevent the camp-followers and th? Native auxiliaries from indulging their taste for human flesh to the utmost.

The gentleman who makes these grave statements is hob a Belgian, but an English medical man—Sidney Langford Hine, described on the title-page of his book as " medical officer of the interior, British East Africa, late Captain Congo Free Stats Forces." A reference to the ' Medical Register' shows that Mr Hinde is a Licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries, London, and qualified in 1890. He was a friend and admirer of Baron Dhanis and loyally supported his chief, but, from many indications in his book, was obviously dissatisfied with the Administration, whose service, be it noted, he has left.—• St. James's Gazette.'