548 The National Geographic Magazine 



ceived. It is not only in the very dry 

 season, when the plant world stretches 

 out before us in every hue from dirty 

 brown to bright gold, that the giraffe 

 harmonizes with its surroundings in this 

 way ; you sometimes cannot distinguish 

 its outline when backed by the green 

 boughs of the trees in the shade. 



"The coloring of giraffes varies very 

 much, even in the same herd. I have 

 seen herds of forty-five or more heads, 

 and from close quarters I have ascer- 

 tained that some were striped quite darkly 

 and some very lightly. All bvdls are 

 colored more or less darkly. 



"Giraffes dwell chiefly on the plains. 

 About seven-tenths of German East 

 Africa represent an El Dorado for gi- 

 raffes. Here they find all the conditions 

 of life necessary to them. They can 

 travel a long way from water, as they 

 can do without it for several days at a 

 time. During the rains they get as 

 much water as they want from the moist 

 leaves. Their food consists chiefly of 

 foliage and of the thin branches of the 

 different acacia trees, as well as the leaves 

 and twigs of many other trees. 



"When in flight a herd clatters away in 

 straight lines, the whole unwieldy body 

 swings backward and forward, the neck 

 swaying like a mast on a moving sea and 

 the tail swinging to and fro. When out- 

 lined against the bare horizon, its appear- 

 ance is grotesque, not unlike that of a 

 bare tree. Even at a distance, one notes 

 the extraordinarily expressive eyes. I 

 have never heard it utter a sound of any 

 kind : it appears to be absolutely dumb. 



The fearful blow it can give with its 

 long legs will hold even a lion in check. 



"The zebra is a polygamous animal, 

 and the jealousy with which the males 

 watch over their harems often results 

 in bloody encounters. They are very 

 malicious beasts. Indeed lions and tigers 

 are far safer to handle than the zebra, 

 with his fearful bite. They make a pecu- 

 liar dog-like barking noise when in flight. 



"None of the attempts to subjugate 

 them as beasts of burden have met with 

 success — a fact much to be regretted, 

 in view of the rapidity with which horses 

 succumb to the tsetse fly. The problem 

 of transportation in East Africa is there- 

 fore far from settled." 



Mr Schillings in his introduction gives 

 credit to several English and German 

 sportsmen who had preceded him in hunt- 

 ing wild game with the camera, but he 

 makes no mention of Hon. George 

 Shiras, 3rd, of Pittsburg, who was by 

 many years the first to picture instead 

 of kill the beasts of the forest and plain. 

 The methods and ingenious flashlight 

 apparatus which Mr Shiras invented in 

 the eighties and early nineties have been 

 employed by every camera sportsman 

 since, and were those used by Mr Schil- 

 lings so successfully in German East 

 Africa. Some of Mr Shiras' photographs 

 were exhibited at the Paris Exposition 

 in 1900, where they were awarded a gold 

 medal, and again at Saint Louis in 1904, 

 where they again received the highest 

 award. About 75 of Mr Shiras' photo- 

 graphs were published in the National 

 Geographic Magazine; in July, 1906. 



SAINT STEPHEN'S FETE IN BUDAPEST 



44 



By De Witt Clinton Falls 



Member of the Nation.vl GEocRArHic Society 



F 



iIV'E o'clock! Five o'clock!" 

 called the night porter of 

 the Grand Hotel Hungaria, 

 as he knocked on the doors of the dif- 

 ferent guests' rooms. It roused them 



from their beds, but not from their slum- 

 bers, for that peaceful state had been 

 rudely broken into two hours before by 

 the ringing of every church bell in this 

 twin citv of the Danube. It was a beau- 



