Birds. 341 



commercial concern, and thither the youth went at an early age. His 

 education by the Jesuits of that colony doubtless tended to create in his 

 mind a taste for exploration, for the members of the famous society have 

 always been noted for the zeal and ability with which they have pursued 

 geographical and ethnological research. When he was about seventeen 

 years of age young Du Chaillu entered his father's trading business, and 

 proceeiied to the United States with a cargo of ebony. It was in New 

 York that he took his initial plunge into literature, a very able series of 

 articles on the Gaboon country appearing in the New York Tribune from 

 his pen. 



In 1855 he was naturalised as an American citizen, and in the same 

 year returned to West Africa, where he immediately .set out upon his 

 first long journey in the interior. For nearly four years he pressed 

 onward through a country up to that time untrodden by the foot of the 

 European, travelling on foot or in canoes without white companions, and 

 covering a total distance of about 8,000 miles. During this protracted 

 itinerary M. du Chaillu shot and preserved thousands of specimens of 

 bird and animal life, sixty of which were previously unknown. The 

 great discovery, however, which overshadowed all his other achievements, 

 brought about a very bitter scientific controversy, but finally placed his 

 name on a secure basis, was that of the Gorilla. It is, of course, well 

 known that for many j'ears rumours from native sources had reached the 

 coast of an extraordinary species of man-like apes, gifted with superhuman 

 agility and strength, and endowed with something like human intelligence ; 

 and, indeed, certain specimens of the skin and skull of a great Simian had 

 been obtained. But down to the time that Paul du Chaillu returned from 

 his wanderings, no European had ever claimed personal acquaintance with 

 this most remarkable member of the monkey tribe, and it was generally 

 believed that the so-called Gorillas were nothing more than unusually fine 

 specimens of the Chimpanzee or Ourang outang, both of which were 

 familiar enough to zoologists. Therefore, when, in 1860, Du Chaillu 

 came back to civilisation from the gloomy forests of West Africa and 

 gave to the world his news that he had himself seen in its native fast- 

 nesses the mysterious creature in question, a war of words arose that has 

 rarely been equalled and never exceeded in the history of science. Du 

 Chaillu, of course, had his opponents and his supporters. On the former 

 side were ranged such men as Dr. Petermann and Dr. Barth, two names 

 to conjure with in Germany, and, indeed, in Europe. On the other were 

 Sir Roderick Murchison and that greatest of modern comparative anato- 

 mists. Sir Richard Owen. Magazine and newspaper articles, papers before 

 learned societies, pamphlets followed one another in rapid succession, 

 alternately attacking and defending M. du Chaillu and the statements 

 contained in the book, "Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial 

 Africa." in which he had set forth his experiences. Not only were his 

 zoological researches discounted, but his maps and other geographical data 

 were questioned, and the controversy reached a climax one night at the 

 meeting of a certain scientific body, when a scene of considerable violence 

 occurred between the explorer and his critics. 



Intensely irritated by the reception which his statements had 

 encountered, Du Chaillu was not at all discouraged. He went out again 

 to West Africa, and, in 1863, he departed on another journey, by which 

 he hoped to cross the continent. He was delayed by the loss of his outfit 

 through the capsizing of a boat, but eventually a start was made. Passing 

 up the Fernand-Vaz river to Obindji he went on to Olenda, in Astivialand, 

 whence he explored much of the surroundmg country, later on proceeding 



