THE GIRAFFE AND OK API 



241 



fact that giraffes never touch water during the whole of the dry winter season — for several 

 months on end. Gemsbok and elands in the same waterless tract of country are complete 

 abstainers for the same period. The flesh of a giraffe cow, if fairly young, is excellent tender 

 and well tasted, with a flavour of game-like veal. The marrow-bones also, roasted over a gentle 

 wood fire, and sawn in half, afford delicious eating, quite one of the supreme delicacies of the 

 African wilderness. 



THE OKAPI 



BY SIR HARRV JOHNSTON, K.C.1 



F.Z.S. 



1 



READERS of "The Living Animals of the World" are in all probability readers of 

 newspapers, and it would therefore be affectation on the part of the writer of these lines 

 to assume that they have not heard more or less of the discovery which lie was 

 privileged to make of an entirely new ruminant 

 of large size, dwelling in the forests bordering 

 the Semliki River, in Central Africa, on the border- 

 land between the Uganda Protectorate and the 

 Congo Free State. The history of this discovery, 

 stated briefly, is as follows: — In 1882-83 I w ' |s 

 the guest of Mr. mow Sir Henry) Stanley on the 

 River Congo at Stanley Pool. I was visiting the Congo 

 at that time as an explorer in a very small way and 

 a naturalist. Mr. Stanley, conversing with me on the 

 possibility of African discoveries, told me then that he 

 believed that all that was most wonderful in tropical 

 Africa would be found to be concentrated in the 

 region of the Blue Mountains, south of the Albert 

 Nyan/.a. This feeling on Stanley's part doubtless was 

 one of the reasons which urged him to go to the 

 relief of Emin Pasha. His journey through the great 

 Congo Forest towards the Blue Mountains of the 

 Albert Nyanza resulted in his discovery of the 

 greatest snow mountain-range of Africa, Ruwenzori, 

 and the river Semliki, which is the Upper Albeitine 

 Nile; of Lake Albert Edward, from which it flows 

 round the flanks of Ruwenzori ; and, amongst other 

 things, in more detailed information regarding the 

 dwarf races of the Northern Congo forests than we 

 had yet received. Stanley also was the first to draw 



the attention of the world to the dense and awful character of these mighty woods, and to 

 hint at the mysteries and wonders in natural history which they possibly contained. The 

 stress and trouble of his expedition prevented him and his companion, from bestowing much 

 attention on natural history; moreover, in these forests it is extremely difficult for persons 

 who are passing hurriedly through the tangle to come into actual contact with the beasts that 

 inhabit them. Sir Henry Stanley, discussing this subject with me since my return from 

 Uganda, tells me that he believes that the okapi is only one amongst several strange new 

 beasts which will be eventually discovered in these remarkable forests. He describes having seen 

 a creature like a gigantic pig 6 feet in length, and certain antelopes unlike any known type. 

 In regard to the okapi, the only hint of its existence which he obtained was the announcement 

 that the dwarfs knew of the existence of a creature in their forests which greatly resembled 

 an ass in appearance, and which the}- caught in pits. This tiny sentence in an appendix to 

 his book " In Darkest Africa " attracted my attention some time before I went to Uganda. 

 It seemed to me so extraordinary that any creature like a horse should inhabit a dense 



Phut 4; Charla Kn^ht'] 



A GIRAFFE BROWSING 



Here the posture is seen to be thcroughly nature. 



