WASTED FILMS 



there, and he told the story so well that I felt myself 

 turning green with envy. The male lion had been 

 asleep, gorged ; the mother, who had been rolhng on 

 her back with the cubs playing over her, was watching 

 the vultures and marabou storks circling overhead. 



I could see it all, the wonderful opportunity, the 

 sort of thing that comes to a man once, generally only 

 once, in a lifetime. If only I had had the luck of those 

 Americans ! 



Still, there was one thing which qualified my envy. 

 I could feel sorry for them, after all, for my host's next 

 remark showed me that they must inevitably have failed 

 to get any films of the slightest value. He himself had 

 not seen the pictures, Hill went on to explain, because 

 they had decided not to develop them until they 

 reached the United States. By that time, of course, 

 as anyone who has used films in the tropics knows, 

 the pictures would be inevitably ruined. Unexposed 

 film will keep good quite a long time ; exposed film 

 must be developed at the earliest possible moment. 

 Once the light has been on it all sorts of chemical 

 actions and reactions take place. I myself make a 

 rule of developing the moment I get a chance. It is 

 better to use the roughest and most inconvenient of 

 dark rooms than to wait. Only those who have 

 secured pictures at the expense of great trouble and risk 

 can enter into the feelings of the photographer when 

 he begins the work of developing. 



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