Our Last "Safari" 



than sixty yards from it, whereupon the animal disappeared 

 amidst a considerable commotion in the water. He never 

 saw the beast again although he waited the whole of the 

 next day on the off-chance, and moreover he examined the 

 complete circle of the lake for spoor, but could find no large 

 tracks of any description either leading to or from the water. 

 He reported the matter to Sir Robert Codrington, who was 

 then the Administrator of Northern Rhodesia, and wrote 

 a report to some museum authorities and there the matter 

 dropped. 



This is the only authentic case, as far as I know, of a 

 trained observer having seen, and reported intelhgently, 

 such a discovery. Knowing the man personally and having 

 heard the account from his own lips, I am inclined to believe 

 in the existence, or the recent existence, of a gigantic saurian. 



Native tradition, legend or behef, call it what you will, 

 bears out this theory. You find it always in lacustrine 

 districts and the report has come to me from many places — 

 from the Albert Nile, from the Highlands of the Great Craters 

 west of Kilimanjaro, from Lake Leopold II, and from Lake 

 Bangweulu. My own actual experiences concerning such 

 an animal confine themselves to the accounts given me by 

 the Buanga natives of Bangweulu, and a large-sized native 

 drawing of a beast resembling in all essentials a bronto- 

 saunis, which I found on a hut in the Ituri forest. I will 

 conclude this diversion by remarking that we know such 

 animals did, a^ .one time, exist in Africa, for the largest fossil 

 specimen ever discovered — which is known as the giganto- 

 saurus and over one hundred feet long — came from German 

 East. It is, however, improbable that one of these great 

 saurians still exists, although possible that some large water 



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