Off to the Congo

"My life among the cannibals"

Chapin may have ignored the rash of popular "description and travel" type books that were appearing in the first years of this century, and he may not have realized that many of them were prosaic fronts for one or another political viewpoint. However, books like Five years with the Congo cannibals, Travel and adventures in the Congo Free State and its big game shooting and Tramps round the mountains of the Moon and through the back gate of the Congo State might have appealed to the young man. Chapin might have even spent some time reading Stanley's adventures, as Stanley was a prolific and entertaining writer, and always came out with a two-volume behemoth whenever he returned from a Congo journey. The New York Public Library holds copies of all of these books.