Page:Travels in West Africa, Congo Français, Corisco and Cameroons (IA travelsinwestafr00kingrich).pdf/136

 point. And now, feeling a strong inclination to discourse of M. de Brazza instead of getting on with my own work, I descend to diary.

May 20th, 1895.—Landed at Gaboon from the Benguella amidst showers of good advice and wishes from Captain Eversfield and Mr. Fothergill, to which an unknown but amiable French official, who came aboard at Batta, adds a lovely Goliath beetle.



The captain winds up with the advice to run the gig on to the beach, and not attempt the steps of Hatton and Cookson's wharf, for he asserts "they are only fit for a hen." However, having had for the present enough of running ashore, I go for the steps, and they are a little sketchy, but quite practicable.

Mr. Fildes, in the absence of the Agent-General, Mr. Hudson, receives me most kindly, and in the afternoon I and Mr. Huyghens, the new clerk out for the firm, are sent off to the Custom House under the guardian care of a French gentleman, who is an agent of Hatton and Cookson's, and who