Chap. III. A LIVE GORILLA CAUGHT. 51 



over the ground, with then- arms extended straight 

 forwards towards the ground, and moving rapidly. 

 I may mention also that having now opened the 

 stomachs of several freshly-killed gorillas I have 

 never found anything but vegetable matter in them. 

 When I returned to Nkongon Mboumba I found 

 there my old friend Akondogo, chief of one of the 

 Commi villages, who had just returned from the Ngobi 

 country, a little further south. To my great surprise 

 and pleasure, he had brought for me a living gorilla, 

 a young one, but the largest I had ever seen captured 

 alive. Like Joe, the young male whose habits in 

 confinement I described in ' Equatorial Africa,' this 

 one showed the most violent and ungovernable dis- 

 position. He tried to bite every one who came near 

 him, and was obliged to be secured by a forked stick 

 closely applied to the back of his neck. This mode of 

 imprisoning these animals is a very improper one if 

 the object be to keep them alive and to tame them, 

 but, unfortunately, in this barbarous country, we had 

 not the materials requisite to build a strong cage. 

 The injury caused to this one by the forked stick 

 eventually caused his death. As I had some more 

 hunting to do, I left the animal in charge of Ak'on- 

 dogo until he should have an opportunity of sending 

 it to me on the Fernand Yaz. 



I cannot avoid relating in this place a very curious 

 instance of a strange and horrid form of monomania 

 which is sometimes displayed by these primitive 

 negroes. It was related to me so circumstantially by 

 Akondogo, and so well confirmed by others, that I 



