216 IN BRIGHTEST AFRICA 
live gorillas. The others followed her not in anger 
but in fear and because they accepted her lead with- 
out realizing that it was involuntary. If their charge 
had been aimed at me they had plenty of time to 
knock me off the mountain side before I could get 
up and shoot again, and the Negroes, being armed 
only with spears and hanging on a precipitous slope, 
were almost as defenceless. 
I began to feel a good deal of confidence in my 
theory that the gorilla is not a ferocious beast, al- 
though I was gaining the utmost respect for his size 
and power. If being molested by man would make 
gorillas ferocious and aggressive, these animals should 
have been excessively dangerous, for within a very 
short time the Prince of Sweden had shot fourteen of 
them, and Barnes had killed several more. The 
very animals that I followed had probably heard the 
guns of these other men. Yet I could see no signs 
of ferocity. When I came up with the old male that 
I had killed first, he had run back and forth on the 
hillside barking in protest or surprise at my intrusion 
just as I have seen little monkeys run back and forth 
on alimb and bark; but of his having savage intentions 
against me I saw no sign. Of the two I was the sav- 
age and the aggressor. In the case of the female I 
had just shot, the same was true, even though she 
was accompanied by her baby. She evidently pre- 
ferred to get away if possible. Cornered, I think and 
hope she would fight for her young. 
What became of the last two animals I do not 
know. The black fur ball that I had fired at was, 
