Ji78 THE GORILLA COUNTRY. 



sudden enthusiasm, but the simple narrative * of one who has 

 seen and hunted the monster in his native wilds. It is true, the 

 same narrative opens up to us a portion of the African continent 

 which until now has been covered with the veil of mystery ; and 

 that the region which is thus made known, is alike interesting 

 from the unsuspected nature of its physical features, and the 

 singular character of some of its human inhabitants, who while 

 skilled in some of the arts of civilized life, are at the same time 

 real unmistakeable cannibals, who make no secret of their 

 partiality for human flesh. But these things have contributed to 

 the prevailing interest only as the accessories of the picture. 

 They enable us to see the " Gorilla country ;" and the one thing 

 that stands out in the fore-front, arresting and riveting the 

 attention of all, is the figure of this huge and terrible man-like 

 Ape, beating his breast with rage, and scowling horrible defiance 

 at the white man, who now for the first time has penetrated to 

 his dismal haunts. 



To the student of Natural History there is a peculiar interest 

 attaching to the Gorilla, from the circumstance that it is an 

 animal which has been recently recovered to science, so to speak, 

 after having been rejected as a mere creation of the fancy. 



In the narratives of several of our older travellers there are 

 frequent references to a large and powerful man-like Ape inha- 

 biting the dense forests of Western Africa, which up to the time 

 of Ouvier were generally regarded as indicating the existence in 

 that region of a species distinct from the Chimpanzee, and of a 

 much more formidable character. But the illustrious author of 

 the Regne Animal almost contemptuously puts aside the notion 

 of this second and larger species of Ape, and assumes that all the 

 supposed references to it properly apply either to the Chimpanzee 

 or to the Mandrill, both of which, as we have already seen, are 

 powerful animals, and much dreaded by the African tribes. The 

 high authority of Cuvier settled for the time the question of a 

 second species of African Ape, and the suppositions monster was 

 thenceforth banished from zoological science. In the year 

 1846, however, an American missionary at the Gaboon met with 



" Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa, with Accounts of 

 the Manners and Customs of the People, and of the Chase of the Gorilla, 

 Crocodile, Leopard, Elephant, Hippopotamus, and other Animals. By 

 PAUL B. DU CJIAILLU." Murray, 1861. 



