AN ORIGINAL MISTAKE
Reading edition
“This work of ‘civilization’ is
an enormous and continual
butchery.” “All the facts we
brought forward in this cham-
ber were denied at first most
energetically; but later, little
by little, they were proved by documents and by official texts.”
“The practice of cutting off hands is said to be contrary
to instructions; but you are content to say that indulgence
must be shown and that this bad habit must be corrected
‘little by little’ and you plead, moreover, that only the hands
of fallen enemies are cut off, and that if hands are cut off
‘enemies’ not quite dead, and who, after recovery, have
had the bad taste to come to
the missionaries and show
them their stumps, it was
due to an original mistake in
thinking that they were
dead.” From Debate in Bel-
gian Parliament, July, 1903.
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