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NATURE 



[April 17, 19 19 



specialist. I was told then that he was a cousin of 

 the family (which also had a French origin, 

 as has been the case with so much of our 

 intellectual, commercial, industrial, and Civil 

 Service aristocracy). I used, earlier than that, to 

 hear of Selous from the Garrods, especially Alfred 

 H. Garrod, the prosector of the Zoological 

 Society (one of the most remarkable men I ever 

 met, who died at the age of thirty-three). My 

 memory cannot have wholly deceived me on this 

 point, since I knew Selous pretty well, and several 

 times in more recent years referred to the Garrods 

 in conversation, believing that this fellow-explorer 

 of Africa had derived — as I had done — some or 

 much of his interest in zoology from Prof. A. H. 

 Garrod. 



determined Selous to make for South Africa. But 

 what led to his parents' conversion to the idea, to 

 the extent of allowing him to start at the very 

 early age of nineteen, and to finance him so 

 liberally, we are not told. 



Selous soon justified their belief in him and his 

 choice of a career. He came back to England 

 (having pushed far into Zambezia) in 1875, ap- 

 parently with a good sum of money on the right 

 side of the balance through his luck and skill in 

 shooting elephants. He returned to the land of 

 his love in 1876, and did not revisit England until 

 1 88 1. He was again back in South Africa in that 

 year; then occurred another few months' holiday 

 in England in 1886; after which Selous became 

 associated markedly with the pioneering work 



Buffaloes alarmed. From " Life of Frederick Courtenay Selous." 



Another point in the biography which is left too 

 indefinite for our natural curiosity is what led to 

 the actual starting of Selous for South Africa in 

 1 87 1, with the helpful capital of 400Z. in his pocket. 

 He was then only in his twentieth year. After 

 leaving Rugby at seventeen, he was sent by his 

 father to Switzerland, Germany, and Austria to 

 study languages and presumably medicine, since 

 his parents seemed to have wished him to become 

 a doctor. But from early boyhood he had set his 

 desires on the very life he ultimately led, one of 

 adventure in Africa — adventure first, but incident- 

 ally the making of suflScient money by the produce 

 of the chase, especially elephant ivory. In Ger- 

 many he met a family returning on a holiday from 

 Natal, and the enthusiastic account husband and 

 wife gave of that truly delightful colony further 

 NO. 2581, VOL. 103] 



which between 1887 and 1893 laid the foundations 

 of Southern Rhodesia. On his return to England 

 in 1893 he was engaged to be married and was 

 proposing to increase his provision for the married 

 state by a lecturing tour in America, when the 

 first war with the Matebele broke out. Conse- 

 quently he felt it his duty to return to South Africa 

 and place his services at Mr. Rhodes 's disposal. 

 He was wounded in this campaign. When it was 

 over he returned home, got married, and made a 

 very extensive wedding tour through Eastern 

 Europe, collecting birds' eggs. The year 1895 

 found him again in Rhodesia attempting to create 

 a farming settlement. 



The second Matebele War, which followed the 

 Jameson Raid, temporarily broke up the farming 

 settlement at Essexvale, and Selous had once more 



