40 EXPERIMENT WITH INDIAN ELEPHANTS. 



Chobe and Zambesi, and therefore the species to which the 

 statements of both refer is probably Glossina morsitans. 



The failure, owing bo Tsetse-fly, of the London Missionary 

 Society's endeavour to use bullock waggons on the road to Lake 

 Tanganyika in 1877 was recorded by E. C. Hore [78] in 1882, 

 and the same writer also gave details of the occurrence of the 

 fly on the shores of Lake Tanganyika itself. In the same year 

 L. K. Rankin [79] described the results of a highly interesting 

 attempt, which was considered to have resulted in success, to 

 discover whether Indian elephants, employed as baggage-animals 

 on the march from Dar-es-Salaam to Mpwapwa, would withstand 

 the attacks of the Tsetse-fly — in this case probably Glossina 

 ^allidipes, Austen. 



Dr. E. Pechuel-Loesche [80], writing in "Die Loango Expedi- 

 tion" (1882), stated that a Tsetse-fly had been collected near 

 Tschintschotscho, about a hundred miles north of the mouth of 

 the Congo. The species is not mentioned, but possibly it was 

 either Gl. palpalis, Rob.-Desv., or Gl. longipaljjis, Wied. Since, 

 however, cattle are kept both at Landana and Boma in the same 

 district, and not only roam about freely, but also thrive toler- 

 ably well, either the fly does not occur near those towns or else 

 the Trypanosome of Tsetse-fly disease is absent ; or, if present, is 

 not carried by the local Tsetse-flies. 



In "The Wild Tril)es of the Soudan," by F. L. James [81], 

 published in 1883, mention was made of a disease called guffer, 

 which attacks camels in the district to the east of Kassala, and 

 was stated by some of the natives to be " caused by the bite of 

 the Tsetse-fly during the rainy season." There is no record, 

 however, of a Tsetse-fly actually having been captured in this 

 region. In the same year a Swiss entomologist named Schoch [83], 

 in a well-reasoned paper, advanced arguments for considering 

 that the Tsetse-fly is not in itself poisonous, but "at most the 

 carrier of a bacterium-like poisonous matter." Nearly every 

 previous writer had referred to the Tsetse-fly as though but a 

 single species existed, but Schoch speaks of " two long- winged 

 Muscidse of similar appearance, one as large as our house-fly, the 

 other somewhat larger, and less dreaded." Apparently, there- 

 fore, the writer in question was acquainted with Glossina fusca, 

 Walk., though he gives no authority for stating it to be " less 

 dreaded " than Gl. morsitans. Various earlier writers had hinted 

 at the probable disappearance of the disease, as the Tsetse either 

 followed or became extinct with the big game, but Schoch 



