May 7, 1896] 



NA TURE 



antiseptic surgery, would have .been obviously unjusti- 

 fiable. 



We have hitherto dwelt chiefly upon his scientific 

 work, but such facts as those just mentioned serve to 

 show how largely he has devoted himself to, and how- 

 much he has advanced, the practical side of his 

 profession. 



It seems almost unnecessary to refer to a list of his 

 honours, which is a very long one, including that of LL.D. 

 Edinburgh, 1878, Hon. M.D. Dublin, 1879, LL.D. Glasgow, 

 1879, D.C.L. Oxon, and LL.D. Cambridge, 1880. He is 

 Surgeon-Extraordinary to the Queen, and Knight of the 

 Prussian order, " Pour le Merite," Knight Commander of 

 the First Class Order of the Danebrog, and honorary 

 member of foreign learned societies without number. He 

 was created a baronet in 1883, and last year succeeded 

 Lord Kelvin as President of the Royal Society. It would 

 be more to the point if one could suitably describe the 

 estimation in which he is held by the civilised world, and 

 the enthusiasm he has always inspired amongst those 

 who have come under his immediate personal influence. 



AN EXPEDITION TO RUWENZORI. 

 A Naturalist in Mid-Africa; being an Account of a 

 tourney to the Mountains of the Moon and Tanganyilca. 

 By G. K. E. Scott Elliot, M.A., F.L.S., F.R.G.S. 8vo. 

 Pp. xvi -1-413, with 50 illustrations and 4 maps. 

 (London : .\. D. Innes and Co., 1896.) 



IX 1862 Baron von der Decken discovered on Kilima 

 N'jaro a number of plants w-hich are quite different 

 from those of the surrounding country, and are allied to 

 those of the mountains of Abyssinia and the Cameroons, 

 and of the lowlands of the Mediterranean and the Cape. 

 The collections made by the late Joseph Thomson on 

 the lower slopes of the same mountain and on the plateau 

 of Masai-land proved the complex nature of the East 

 African flora, and enabled Sir Joseph Hooker, in a paper 

 which is one of the classics of African literature, to 

 suggest the sources whence its constituents were derived. 

 The interest thus aroused in the geographical affinities 

 of this flora subsequently sent Sir H. H. Johnston and 

 a host of German botanists to undertake detailed work 

 in Kilima Xjaro. Still more recently it inspired Mr. 

 Scott Elliot to undertake his adventurous iourney to 

 Ruwenzori ; for he tells us in his opening page, that the 

 object of his expedition was " to solve the question of 

 botanical areas which on this side of Africa had often 

 puzzled me." 



Mr. Scott Elliot left Mombasa in Noxember 1893, and 

 began his march into the interior along the'track known 

 as the " Uganda road.' His men had been chosen for 

 him by the agents of the British East .Africa Company, 

 and the selection does not appear to have been a good 

 one. Mr. Scott Elliott had to dismiss his head man, the 

 terms of whose engagement were at least remarkable ; 

 and his opinion of Zanzibari (or " .Suahili,' as he generally 

 calls them; appears to have been permanently affected 

 by the unsatisfactory character of his men. The narra- 

 tive takes us rapidly across the country of the Wakamba 

 to that of the Masai, in which the author had the mis- 

 fortune to lose all his donkeys and their loads. He 

 pressed on to Kavirondo, and thence along the northern 

 NO. 1384, VOL. 54] 



shores of the Victoria Nyanza to Uganda, The direc 

 route on to Ruwenzori was unsafe, as Kabbarega 

 the king of Unyoro, was then at war with the British 

 authorities. Anxious to avoid interference from this 

 chief, whom he describes as one of the " ruffians of the 

 sort who always obtain the sympathy of Mr. Labouchere," 

 Mr. Scott Elliot kept southward along the western shore 

 of the Nyanza. Having reached the Kagera River, he 

 followed up this, and crossed .Ankole to the southern end 

 of Ruwenzori. This was the main goal of the expedition, 

 and Mr. Scott Elliot spent four months exploring and 

 collecting on the flanks of this snow-capped range. He 

 made several attempts to reach the snow-line, but the 

 nature of the work and illness prevented him. His 

 account of mountaineering in Central Africa is not 

 inviting. 



" It was an awful ascent. Sometimes over deep moss, 

 where jagged root-ends of heather seemed to spring out 

 and stab ankles and knees at every step ; sometimes 

 through a dense wood of gnarled and twisted heather- 

 trees, fifteen to twenty feet high, and covered with grey 

 lichens, then down a steep little ravine and dense jungle ; 

 and things soon became very hopeless. Everything was 

 shrouded in a cold chilling mist, and first one man and 

 then another became knocked up, until at about 10 a.m. 

 I was left alone. I went on by myself till 2 p.m. The 

 effect of mountain sickness was most trying ; I could not 

 walk more than fifty yards without stopping to get 

 breath, and by 2 p.m. I was utterly exhausted, and with- 

 out food or anything to sleep in. This was at about 

 12,500 feet." 



The level at which the author suffered from mountain 

 sickness was unusually low ; hut it can be easily explained 

 as due to the effects of malarial fever, which renders men 

 liable to attacks of this malady, at elevations at which 

 they would otherwise be safe. 



Two of the men who took part in this excursion never 

 recovered from it, and next time Mr. Scott Elliot tried 

 the ascent, he went alone. He succeeded in I'eaching 

 the height of 13,000 feet, after a weary struggle with 

 rain, and cold and fever. Climbing over some half- 

 buried boulders, he fell and nearly bi'oke his leg ; after 

 this, numbed with cold, and shivering with fever, he 

 crawled back to the point where he had left his blanket- 

 bag^, when fireless and foodless in the drenching rain, 

 the night passed as "a sort of horrible dream." 



Though Mr. Scott Elliot did not reach the summit of 

 Ruwenzori, he reached the Alpine meadows below the 

 snow-line, and this for his purpose was far more 

 important. 



From Ruwenzori he returned to the Kagera River at 

 the point where he had left it, and followed it southward 

 through Karagwe, of Speke's description of which Mr. 

 Scott Elliot speaks most highly. He crossed Urundi to 

 the northern end of Tanganyika ; he journeyed down 

 the lake by dhow, marched along the Stevenson road 

 to Lake Nyasa, and then returned home by the Zambesi. 



Mr. Scott Elliot's book consists of twenty chapters, 

 which may be divided into two groups. The larger of 

 these is devoted to the narrative of the expedition. This 

 gives a most interesting record of a brilliant piece of 

 pioneer exploration, which was carefully planned, was 

 pluckily carried out in spite of exceptional discourage- 

 ments, and is described with much charm of style and 



