Flashlights from the Jungle 



535 



Mr Schillings refers 

 to the case of the late 

 Dr Kolb, a German 

 who came out to Brit- 

 ish East Africa in 

 connection with a 

 Utopian undertaking 

 called "Freeland," and 

 who, when his politi- 

 cal scheme became im- 

 possible, applied him- 

 self to the reckless 

 slaughter of the big 

 game of British Af- 

 rica. "In the course 

 of two or three years 

 he had slain, for no 

 useful purpose what- 

 ever, one hundred and 

 fifty rhinoceroses (a 

 companion killed one hundred and forty 

 more), each one being a far more in- 

 teresting mammal than himself. At the 

 end of this career of slaughter a rhi- 

 noceros killed him — perhaps appro- 

 priately." 



The same is true of the giraffes, the 

 lions, and practically all the larger ani- 

 mals. 



He emphasizes the fact, however, that 

 this extermination is wrought not so 

 much by the sportsman as by the trader, 

 and especially by large numbers of Afri- 

 cans who have been given guns and am- 

 munition. 



"I maintained rigorously the princi- 

 ple of keeping my caravan (in which I 

 had never less than 130 men) upon a 

 vegetable diet for the most part, allow- 

 ing them meat only to a very small 

 extent, and then merely as an adjunct 

 to their meals. In the famine year of 

 1899 my provisions cost me more than 

 20,000 marks, which might have been 

 brought down to a trifling sum had I 

 taken heavier toll of the game, as the na- 

 tives were always ready to barter vege- 

 tables for animals I had killed." 



When the reader remembers that all 

 expenses of Mr Schillings' expeditions 

 were paid for out of his private means, 



A Great Bull Eland 



this action on his part appears all the 

 more commendable. He shot many ani- 

 mals, but brought home his specimens — 

 40 lions, 35 leopards, large numbers of 

 hyenas, jackals, and other beasts of prey, 

 and many birds. 



One can form no notion from seeing 

 a stuffed girafTe or rhinoceros in a mu- 

 seum of the immense difficulties involved 

 in the securing and preparing of such a 

 specimen. When the animal has been 

 shot and its skin carefully prepared, all 

 the fat removed from it and every pre- 

 caution taken against flaws, the skull 

 and bones also having been cleaned sepa- 

 rately, the collector has still to take im- 

 mense pains about the transport to Eu- 

 rope. The weighty burden has to be 

 carried on men's shoulders to the coast, 

 along dangerous tracks, often through 

 marshes and almost pathless thickets, and 

 across streams and rivers. The ravages 

 of insects and the damp atmosphere have 

 to be fought against. There are long 

 weeks of anxiety before the goal is 

 reached. 



All this trouble, to say nothing of the 

 considerable expense, is involved in the 

 bringing home in good condition of a 

 single such specimen ; but Mr Schillings 

 has brought home quite a number of 



