Expedition to Escape from Society Life "An Expedition of Adventure and Business is shortly leaving for Central Africa, and a vacancy has occurred for another member. Apply—"
This advertisement appeared in the London "Daily News" and a man called to see the leader of the expedition. He found the leader to be a woman—Mrs. Diana Strickland—who is taking out an expedition to Central Africa in September.
The party of two women, four men, and 300 native porters will start from Boma, on the West Coast of Africa, and will make its way on footethrough the Bahuni country, which is practically unexplored, through the Ituri Forest to the North-East Congo, then east of Lake Edward, and finally to Kenya.
"We expect to be away 12 months, and shall travel 3,000 miles, all on foot,' said, Mrs. Strickland. "The expedition is limited to six Europeans on account of the food difficulty, for we have to take it all with us, and this necessitates 50 native porters for each person.
"We hope to trade in ivory and some prospecting, and we are also making a collection for the New York Zoological Park, and hope to get an okapi (a survivor of a distant ancestor of the giraffe), a giant field hog, and some pigmy elephants.
"To cross the various rivers we have had a collapsible wooden raft made which packs up into six loads. Other kinds of rafts are not so satisfactory.
"We shall be pretty well armed, you know, and oven are taking an American machine-gun in case
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.