May 26, 1910] 



NA TURE 



\77 



IS due to their own original research, or, quite fairly ' 

 as does Mr. Maugham), as the work and conclusions ' 

 i)f other people. But in this transposition, not having : 

 sufficient technical knowledge, perhaps, they allow \ 

 hemselves or their printers to mar these summaries 

 .vith ridiculous mistakes in names, EngHsh or Latin, 

 Dr they repeat the few errors of the persons from ; 

 .vhom they borrow. Mr. Maugham does more. He 

 idds a little acid to his work by recounting the 

 heories of his predecessors or fellow-travellers (and 

 .ery often misinterpreting them in the repetition) and 

 hen holding them up to ridicule ; while at the same 

 rime it is patent to a specialist that he has not taken 

 :he trouble to understand w-hat appears to him absurd. 

 I pointed out the same tendency in an earlier work 

 3f his, in which he chose — one does not know why — 

 10 ridicule theories of the origin of the Bantu 

 languages set forth by English and German philo- 

 logists, while by his own confession (and certainly 

 by the evidence in his text) he was without special 

 i n o w ledge of 

 :he subject. 



If it were not 

 For this desire 

 3n his part to 

 have a dig at all 

 md sundry who 

 liave at one time 

 3r another writ- 

 ten on the coun- 

 tries of South- 

 East Africa, he 

 Rould have 

 given us a most 

 agreeable, as 

 well as a most 

 interesting, 

 book ; for when 

 e confines him- 

 self to his own 

 researches and 

 observations he 

 arouses the in- 

 terest of the 

 reader and 

 secures the ad- 

 iiesion and re- 

 spect of those 

 who know Africa 

 as well as he 

 does, or even 

 better. The 

 -eader's atten- 

 tion should be 

 directed to the 

 author's sensible remarks on pp. 157-9, as to 

 the proportions of the European hold over 

 the southern half of Africa. These should be a 

 corrective to any excessive exultation. In several 

 directions also he renders service to the very few 

 persons in the United Kingdom, and to the three or 



jfour individuals in the southern half of Africa, who 

 are foolish enough to care for the preservation of 

 big game and of interesting birds and beasts. He 

 points out with absolute truth the nonsense of the 

 theory that connects the spread of the Glossina tsetse- 



( flies with the abundance of big game : the theory 

 which is quoted by the officers of the British South 



i Africa Companv, and of other great companies con- 



^ trolling South Central Africa, and by the thousands of 

 " sportsmen " now swarming over Africa and slaying 

 everything right and left, as their justification for 

 spurning game regulations and mocking at the 

 attempts of a few " fanatics " who think that at any 

 rate a selection of the big and interesting wild beasts 



NO. 21 17, VOL. 83] 



might be preserved for the intelligent appreciation 

 of later generations. He cites this example of the 

 falsity of the theory.^ There is a considerable region 

 of desolate country lying betw-een the west bank of 

 the Shire River and the north bank of the Zambezi 

 up to the vicinity of Tete. In this district, across- 

 which passes the Cape-to-Cairo telegraph line, there 

 are few human inhabitants, and there is absolutely 

 no wild game. Yet here the tsetse swarms, as it 

 does, possibly, nowhere else in Africa; in fact, its 

 extraordinary abundance has driven away most of the 

 human inhabitants because they have found it impos- 

 sible to keep any form of domestic animal. Now, if 

 this district swarmed with game, one would be 

 justified in supposing that by destroying the game one 

 might drive away the tsetse. But apparently the 

 Glossina flies have made life unbearable for all 

 creatures that do not fly or burrow in the ground, and 

 yet they continue to sw-arm. 



Mr. Maugham, however, is not always consistent 



Zambcziaa Goldsmiihi : and Huts bull: upon Piles. From '' Zambezia." 



in his desire to create a little tolerance for the exist- 

 ence of beasts and birds, not as yet of interest to 

 South African settlers or sportsmen. He says con- 

 temptuously that " the rhinoceros will have to' go," 

 but gives no justification for such an utterance. To 

 the intellectual interests of the world the two forms 

 of existing African rhinoceros are quite as important 

 as (let us say) the moderate prosperitj' of a few 

 European settlers. 



But, of course, the only proper solution of this ques- 

 tion in Zambezia, as w^ell as elsewhere, is the marking 

 off of game preserv'es which shall grow by degrees 

 into national parks, and shall harbour and sustain 

 the wild fauna. In the intervening regions the land 

 must be given up to exploitation by man, black or 

 white, and any game straying beyond the reserves 

 should receive no protection. But, of course, the 



1 Further support is given to his remarks in the very interesting article on 

 the flora and fauna of Ngamiland (by Major Lugard) just published in 

 the Kew Bulletin ard deserving special notice. 



