4 AFRICAN GAME ANIMALS 



the difficulties or danger from native attack in the region 

 traversed by the Victoria Nile, the explorers chose a route 

 westward through the central portion of Unyoro and thence 

 northwest across the Victoria Nile to the Bahr el Jebel or 

 upper Nile. They thus missed by a few miles the discovery 

 of the Albert Nyanza of which the natives had given them 

 accounts. On their journey down the Nile they met at 

 Gondokoro Sir Samuel Baker who was ascending the river 

 on a mission of discovery concerning its source. He re- 

 ceived from Speke and Grant information concerning their 

 discoveries and of the native reports of another large lake 

 on the borders of western Unyoro. Baker soon afterward, 

 in 1864, ascended the Nile and discovered this lake which 

 he named the Albert Nyanza. The amount of natural- 

 history material brought to Europe by Speke and Grant is 

 really marvellous considering the limited means of trans- 

 portation at their disposal and the great length of their 

 journey. They brought collections of mammals, birds, rep- 

 tiles, fishes, insects, and plants, accompanied by extensive 

 field notes. ^ 



Subsequent explorers of the same district for the follow- 

 ing thirty years failed to equal these initial efforts to give 

 to the world a knowledge of the fauna and flora of equatorial 

 Africa. Stanley with the immense resources at his com- 

 mand is a notable example of this sort. He followed in the 

 paths cut by these two intrepid explorers, but added very 

 little to the discoveries made by his predecessors, and he 

 further accumulated only an infinitesimal number of speci- 

 mens or amount of information concerning the animal and 

 plant life of the regions he visited. 



Speke and Grant collected fourteen specimens of hoofed 



