furnish them with produce and to work for the Company, as also to pursue as rebels and outlaws those

who sought to escape from the requisitions imposed upon them. That, above all, the fact that the arrest of women and their detention, to compel the villages to furnish both produce and workmen, was tolerated and admitted even by certain of the administrative authorities of the region. Yet another example of the workings of the system: In the morning, when about to start for K, many people from the surrounding country came in to see me. They brought[Pg 63] with them three individuals who had been shockingly wounded by gun fire, two men and a very small boy, not more than six years of age, and a fourtha boy child of six or sevenwhose right hand was cut off at the wrist. One of the men, who had been shot through the arm, declared that he was Y of L, a village situated some miles away. He declared that he had been shot as I saw under the following circumstances: the soldiers had entered his town, he alleged, to enforce the due fulfilment of the rubber tax due by the community. These men had tied him up and said that unless he paid 1,000 brass rods to them they would shoot him. Having no rods to give them they had shot him through the arm and had left him. I may say that among my photographs are several with shattered arms who have been treated in this fashion. This is how the natives were treated when they complained to the white man: In addition, fifty women are required each morning to go to the factory and work there all day. They complained that the remuneration given for these services was most inadequate, and that they were continually beaten. When I asked the chief W why he had not gone to D F to complain if the sentries beat him or his people, opening his mouth he pointed to one of the teeth which was just dropping out, and said: That is what I got from the D F four days ago when I went to tell him what I now say to you. He added that he was frequently beaten, along with others of his people, by the white man. One sentry was taken almost red-handed by Mr. Casement: After some little delay a boy of about fifteen years of age appeared, whose left arm was wrapped up in a dirty rag. Removing this, I found the left hand had been hacked off by the wrist, and that a shot hole appeared in the fleshy part of the forearm. The boy, who gave his name as I I, in answer to my inquiry, said that a sentry of the La Lulanga Company now in the town had cut off his hand. I proceeded to look for this man, who at first could not be found, the natives to a considerable number gathering behind me as I walked through the town. After some delay the sentry appeared, carrying a cap-gun. The boy, whom I placed before him, then accused him to his face of having mutilated him. The men of the town,[Pg 64] who were questioned in succession, corroborated the boys statement. The sentry, who gave his name as K K, could make no answer to the charge. He met it by vaguely saying some other sentry of the Company had mutilated I I; his predecessor, he said, had cut off several hands, and probably this was one of the victims. The natives around said that there were two other sentries at present in the town, who were not so bad as K K, but that he was a villain. As the evidence against him was perfectly clear, man after man standing out and declaring he had seen the act committed, I informed him and the people present that I should appeal to the local authorities for his immediate arrest and trial. The following extract must be my final quotation from Consul Casements report: I asked then how this tax was imposed. One of them, who had been hammering out an iron neck-collar on my arrival, spoke first. He said: I am N N. These other two beside me are O O and P P, all of us Y. From our country each village had to take twenty loads of rubber. These loads were big: they were as big as this. (Producing an empty basket which came nearly up to the handle of my walking-stick.) That was the first size. We had to fill that up,