266 



ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1936 



abrupt hill sides without the lungs trying to burst their way through 

 one's chest. 



The first rencontre with the gorillas took place on the afternoon of 

 a day when I had indulged in the fatuous task of gorilla locating, 

 toiling wearily up hill and down dale for several exhausting hours — 

 in the wrong direction. Having reached the furthest point that we 

 were likely to get that day, news was shouted down the valley from a 



^1 



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Campl«v«L 



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 I- 



If 



Shrs. 



FiGDRB 2. — Graphs, in terms of ascents and descents to the approximate time factor, of 

 two routes followed during the same day in the course of gorilla investigations, in order 

 to illustrate the existing conditions. 



village many hundreds of feet above us, that gorillas had been lo- 

 cated at no great distance the other side of the camp. So, before 

 the quest could be really taken up there was first the exacting march 

 back to headquarters; but see the graph (fig. 2) — most descriptive — 

 of the day's wanderings. There is no need to describe the ups and 

 downs, nor the tyj)e of country traversed, but what is noteworthy is 

 the fact that the troop of five, which I was fortunate enough to be 

 able to study at close quarters, was feeding in a forested valley less 

 than a mile away from, and overlooked by, a small mountain set- 

 tlement. 



Most troops are easily located, as the guttural grunts with which 

 at times the members appear to maintain a regular conversation can 

 be heard at a considerable distance, and, in consequence, the pygmy 



