CREATURES OF THE WILDERNESS 147 



lake shores, Africa is still a marvellous museum 

 of living specimens. It is not many years 

 since its forests yielded the okapi, a large 

 beast, suggestive of zebra and giraffe in one, 

 hitherto unknown to Europeans and a mystery 

 even to the natives. Many African animals, 

 including the hippopotamus, zebra and giraffe, 

 are found nowhere outside of the continent. 



The spell of the African forest is distinct 

 from that of the jungle in India. The equa- 

 torial region is more mysterious and further 

 from civilisation. India has been under 

 European rule for more than a century. Its 

 jungle supports a dense human population, and 

 the natives, though superstitious as all Eastern 

 races are, know a good deal of the wild crea- 

 tures and their ways. Railways penetrate in all 

 directions, even high into the hills. There is a 

 little insect in Africa known as the tsetse-fly 

 there are several kinds, but I refer to the one 

 associated with the terrible disease known as 

 sleeping sickness which must always, so far 

 as we can see at present, exclude Europeans 

 from thousands of square miles, but there is no 

 such scourge in India. 



Even where this poisonous carrier of infec- 

 tion is unknown, the climate of Africa is, in 

 many parts, almost intolerable. It is less a 

 question of darkness than of glare. Then, 

 again, the natives are in every respect, save 



