AFRICA: Drumming Baptist

For years the doomful sound of drumming in the Congo night struck white men weak with fright. Black tribesmen, pounding out an ominous drum language of their own, threatened death to pale interlopers.

Of late the white man's telephone has made many tribesmen lose respect for their ancient art of drum conversation. They have forgotten their drum vocabulary, the drum names given them at birth.

From Stanleyville, Belgian Congo, Chicago Daily Newsman George Weller last week told how a young British Baptist missionary had gone so far native as to revive drum talking. John Carrington, 29, learned the drum tongue from...