SKETCH OF FREDERICK C. SELOUS. 259 



sport and a hunter's prowess, and was regarded in that light by tho 

 critics and the general public. The Royal Geographical Society, 

 however, perceived other qualities in the story he had to tell, and 

 gave him successively honorable mention, the Cuthbert Peake 

 grant, and, in 1883, the Founder's Gold Medal, the highest honor 

 it had to bestow. 



Among the earliest testimonials paid by this society to the value, 

 as yet not generally appreciated, of Selous's w^ork was that given 

 by Lord Aberdare, president, in his anniversary address, delivered 

 in May, 1881, to the services rendered to geography in the regions 

 west of Lake Nyassa by Mr. Selous, who had " hitherto been known 

 as a mighty hunter of large game. . . . This gentleman, w^e learn, 

 in 1878 penetrated for one hundred and fifty miles the unknown 

 country north of the Zambezi, in the direction of Lake Bangweolo. 

 He has since crossed in various directions the Matabele country 

 south of the Zambezi, discovering two new rivers and. defining the 

 course of others which had previously been laid down from vague 

 information." Selous's jSI'otes on the Chobi, it appears, had al- 

 ready been published by the Geographical Society. 



Mr. Selous has spent most of his time since he began his Af- 

 rican wanderings in 1871, except for occasional visits to England, in 

 traveling and hunting over that part of the African continent with 

 Avhich his name as an explorer is associated. Li 1877 he and 

 some companions penetrated into Matabeleland to hunt elejDhants. 

 Relating the story of his wanderings in an address to the Royal 

 Geographical Society in 1893, he described his experiences with 

 fever and ague, the attacks of which began in Griqualand in 1872, 

 but came on only when he halted anywhere a few days. Xorth 

 of the Zambezi he made several journeys among the Balongas, 

 and spent a wretched rainy season, almost without equipment, 

 on the Manica table-land, of the luxuriant vegetation of which, 

 with sweet-smelling flowers after the rains, he gave a glowing de- 

 scription in his address. Interesting observations wore made on 

 some of the northern rivers. The curious phenomena of the steady 

 rise of the Avaters of the Chobi and Machabi— an outlet of the 

 Okavango- — was observed from the first week in June till the last 

 week in September, when the flood began to recede. 



From 1882 the journeys acquired additional geographical im- 

 portance, and Mr. Selous proceeded to rectify the maps of Ma- 

 shonaland made by earlier travelers, taking constant compass bear- 

 ings, sketching the courses of rivers, and fixing the positions of 

 tributaries. The value of this work was made manifest in a magr 

 nificent large scale map of the country. 



This map, which was published in 1895, was intended, first and 



