APPENDIX E 



PROTKCTIVE COLORATION 



Mk. Digmokk has taken a wonderful series of photographs of 

 African big game. Mr. Kearton has taken a series of moving 

 pictures of various big animals which were taken alive by Buflalo 

 Jones and his two cowboys, Loveless and Meany, on his recent trip 

 to East Africa — a trip on which they were accompanied by a 

 former member of my regiment, Guy Scull. All three men are 

 old-time Westerners and plainsmen, skilled in handling both horse 

 and rope. They took their big, powerful, thoroughly trained cow 

 horses with them, and roped and captured a lioness, a rhinoceros, 

 a giraffe, and other animals. I regard these feats of my three 

 fellow-countrymen as surpassing any feats which can possibly be 

 performed by men who hunt with the rifle. 



For the natural history of African big game, probably the 

 three most valuable books — certainly the most valuable modern 

 books — are Selous's "African Nature Notes," Schilling's " Flash- 

 light and llifle," and Millais's "Breath from the Veldt." The 

 photographer plays an exceedingly valuable part in Nature study, 

 but our appreciation of the great value of this part must never 

 lead us into forgetting that as a rule even the best photograph 

 renders its highest service when treated as material for the best 

 picture, instead of as a substitute for the best picture ; and that 

 the picture itself, important though it is, comes entirely secondary 

 to the text in any book worthy of serious consideration either from 

 the standpoint of science or the standpoint of literature. Of 

 course this does not mean any failure to appreciate the absolute 

 importance of photographs — of Mr. Dugmore's capital photo- 

 graphs, for instance ; what I desire is merely that we keep in 

 mind, when books are treated seriously, the relative values of the 

 photograph, the picture, and the text. The text, again, to be of 

 the highest worth, must be good both in form and in substance — 

 that is, the writer who tells us of the habits of big game must be a 

 man of ample personal experience, of trained mind, of keen powers 



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