HUNTING GORILLAS 209 
up on its leaning trunk, and back again to its base, 
where he came to rest with his head hanging over 
on one side of the tree and his feet on the other. 
Had there been a single movement in him he must 
have goneon. The solid from the right barrel had 
done its work well—in just above the heart through 
the «orta, through the spine, and out through the 
right shoulder blade. As he came crashing down 
I somehow felt confident that all was well. I have 
never had a more thrilling experience, but I’ve been 
much more frightened many times. The gun-bearer 
was a trump. He was the worst scared black man 
I ever saw. If I looked as frightened as he, I am 
thankful no movie camera was on the job. You see, 
he was between me and the beast when he struck the 
trail eight feet away. 
I had left the cameras and tools in camp to be sent 
for if they were needed. As the beast lay, a camera 
could not be used. I could do nothing in sketches 
worth while, so I sent for nothing. I set to work with 
my jack-knife and one of the boys had a native iron 
knife and with these two tools we skinned and skele- 
tonized the gorilla. As we turned him over it kept 
all hands busy to avoid losing the balance of the beast 
and ourselves. It took more than a half hour to 
get the skin and skeleton back to where I had shot 
from—a human rope stunt. The boys all worked 
beautifully. Then we had the long, hard trek back 
to camp. 
All hands in camp (forty odd) got a present— 
enough so that they were all happy, although that 
