December 19, 1901] 



NATURE 



149 



imitation. We have submitted Mr. Du Chaillu's volume 

 to several friends of diverse ages and sexes in the hope 

 of obtaining an opinion as to the class of readers for 

 whose benefit it is specially intended, but in no instance 

 have we succeeded in obtaining a definite answer on 

 this point. One thing is perfectly certain, namely, that 

 no scientific naturalist will gain any information worth 

 having from a perusal of its pages. A lady suggested 

 hat it was like a book for very young children, without 

 being sufficiently amusing. 



The author, who firmly believes that animals have a 

 definite language by means of which they communicate 

 their ideas, not only to their own fellows, but to the 

 members of other species as well, had a grand subject 

 before him in describing the life of the denizens of the 

 great Congo forest. But, in our opinion, the conversa- 

 tion he has put into the mouths of the animals is the 

 merest drivel. And when animals, such as leopards 

 antelopes and elephants, have familiar English names> 

 we quite fail to see the advantage of alluding to them' 

 by their negro titles, apparently for the sake of 

 translating them. When an animal like Tmge/apkus 

 euryceros has no good English name, it is right and proper 

 that its native title — in this case " bongo"— should- be 

 employed ; but the substitution of " kambi " for antelope 

 is merely confusing. Neither is the work altogether free 

 from absolute errors, while in several instances state- 

 ments that have been controverted reappear as though 

 they were undoubted facts. As an example of the former 

 class we may refer to the statement on p. 42 that " large 

 flocks of toucans (a bird with a huge bill)" are among 

 the denizens of the Congo forest ! As an instance of the 

 second kind, it may be mentioned that (pp. 154-155) the 

 author revives the old story of the gorilla advancing to 

 the attack in the upright posture, beating his breast with 

 his fists. We thought this story had been disposed 

 of by Winwood Reade, who denies that du Chaillu ever 

 saw a living gorilla in the wild state ; and, so far as we 

 are aware, no subsequent traveller, with better informa- 

 tion at command, has ever said a word in its support. 



Again, several of the incidents related appear abso- 

 lutely incredible. For instance, on p. 95 we have a 

 wonderful picture of a gorilla struggling to free himself 

 from a porcupine on which he had incautiously trodden 

 in his descent from a tree. Bearing in mind the well- 

 known power in wild animals of detecting the presence 

 of other creatures, such an event requires the most con- 

 vincing testimony to render it credible, and yet it is 

 related without special comment. In another chapter 

 (p. 160) we are told how a python coiled around a tree- 

 trunk " made a tremendous spring " and in an instant 

 was coiled tightly round the body of an unfortunate 

 antelope, which it squeezed to death. How a python 

 could make the spring in question and at the same time 

 disengage itself from the tree around which it was coiled 

 we are not told. As a minor matter, a small inaccuracy 

 in connection with this anecdote may be mentioned. In 

 the accompanying illustration the antelope, which is evi- 

 dently one of those species of which the females are 

 unarmed, is represented with horns, and yet in the text it 

 is alluded to as a female. 



Although it is certainly incorrect to call a land-tortoise 

 a turtle (p. loi), this confusion in terms may perhaps 

 NO. 1677, VOL. 65] 



be excused on account of the author's nationality. A 

 similar excuse cannot, however, possibly be made for the 

 statement on p. 266 that "a pack of ugly-looking striped 

 hysnas" advanced into the moonlight. In the first 

 place, striped hyasnas are quite unknown in West 

 Africa ; and, in the second, the author is refuted by his 

 own draughtsman, who, in the plate on the opposite page, 

 has figured an unmistakable group of spotted hyaenas. 

 Moreover, if we mistake not, the illustration in question 

 is based, without acknowledgment, on a picture which 

 has already appeared elsewhere. 



Neither can we congratulate the author on his views 

 with regard to the raison d'etre of the coloration of 

 certain animals. It has, for instance, been almost con- 

 clusively proved by Mr. Pocock in this Journal (vol. Ixii. 

 p. 584) that the striking type of coloration prevalent 

 among the harnessed antelopes is strictly protective. 

 And yet, when referring to the bongo (a member of the 

 group), the author (p. 223) writes as follows ; — 



" ' My beauty is my curse, dear kambis and ncheris,' 

 replied the bongo; 'my yellow colour and my white 

 stripes are my bane, for my enemies, which are also 

 yours, can spy me further and quicker than they do 

 you ' '■ 



Quite apart from the misapprehension of the object 

 of the bongo's colouring, it may strike the reader of this 

 marvellous book that animals thus endowed with the 

 "knowledge of good and evil," as indicated by their 

 conversation, might have been trusted to have devised 

 some artificial mode of concealing themselves from their 

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