CAMERA ADVENTURES IN THE AFRICAN WILDS 



391 



"For about two hours I had been 

 straining both eyes and ears, when sud- 

 denly, to my astonishment, a huge hon 

 appeared. He was standing close to the 

 zebra when I first discovered him, and I 

 could not understand how he could possi- 

 bly have come without being seen or 

 heard. Yet there he stood, the king of 

 beasts, the most feared animal in Africa, 

 not twelve yards away." 



The lions weigh on an average over 

 five hundred pounds each, and yet their 

 approach was so silent and stealthy that 

 Dugmore always failed to detect their 

 coming until the tearing of flesh and 

 breaking of bones of the bait proclaimed 

 their arrival. 



By pressing the electric button the 

 flash was then fired, but the lions would 

 only retreat for one hundred or two hun- 

 dred yards, where they would make the 

 night hideous with their roaring. It was 

 then the pleasant duty of the photogra- 

 pher to emerge from the protection of 

 his hut, reload his three cameras and the 

 flashlight apparatus, w^hile the chorus of 

 the lions continued. On one night Mr 

 Dugmore secured photographs of twelve 

 different lions. 



Mr Dugmore speaks most enthusi- 

 astically of the wise precautions taken 

 by the British government to prevent the 

 extinction of game. In addition to the 

 regulations forbidding the shooting of 

 game along the railways, the authorities 

 have set aside about 10,000 square miles 

 as a reserve in which no shooting is 

 allowed. The abundance of game in the 

 free-zone is simply extraordinary. 



"We could see countless herds of ani- 

 mals," hartebeest and gazelles, zebra, 

 elands, etc. "Our excitement reached its 

 highest pitch when we discovered a large 

 giraffe standing complacently, scarcely 

 one hundred and fifty vards from the 

 snorting train. How different the huge 

 creature looked in his natural state from 

 those we had seen in zoos or menage- 

 ries! How different the deep, rich col- 

 oring and the dark, well-defined mark- 

 ings from the faded coat of the beast in 

 captivity! This splendid animal, tower- 

 ing above the small trees, after watching 



us for a few seconds, ambled away to 

 what he considered a safe distance." 



The most unpopular of all the animals- 

 in British East Africa, says Mr Dug- 

 more, are the zebras. 



"They looked like painted ponies with 

 their strongly defined black stripes, and 

 were beautiful beyond words. It is- 

 curious how they appeal to the new ar- 

 rival, while,, if you speak to the settler 

 of the zebra as being even worthy of 

 notice, he smiles sadly, and commences- 

 a torrent of abuse against what he con- 

 siders one of the worst pests of the coun- 

 try. They would like to see them wiped, 

 oft' the face of the earth, and the hand- 

 some creatures Rre killed in great num- 

 bers to be used as food for the native- 

 workmen, or even for the dogs. .\nd 

 yet they can scarcely be said to be de- 

 creasing except in very restricted areas. 



"The cause for this common dislike of 

 the zebra is his objectionable habit of 

 disregarding fences. A herd will stam- 

 pede, and ten or twenty panels of a 

 barbed wire fence are down like a flash,, 

 and then, as likely as not, they will wheel 

 round and repeat the operation at an- 

 other point. In places where fences are 

 measurable by miles, it is of the most 

 importance that they should be kept in a 

 good state of repair. The destruction of 

 a few panels may mean immense dam- 

 age to crops, and perhaps the loss of val- 

 uable ostriches : hence the settlers' lack 

 of love for the cantankerous, though 

 beautiful, zebra. 



"So far no practical use for the ani- 

 mal has been discovered. They are not 

 easily tamed and. generally speaking, are 

 extremelv bad-temperad, so that they are 

 most difficult to break or handle, and it 

 is almost certain that they are not worth 

 the trouble, owing to their lack of stam- 

 ina. Contrar\- t(^ poptilar opinion, they 

 are not very fast, and have no staying 

 power." 



The huge and clumsv hippo conceals 

 in its immense mouth teeth which some- 

 times attain a length of over five feet,. 

 and vet this gigantic pig eats onlv grass. 



"The beast is frenuentiv shot for its 

 ivorv, which is quite valuable. Then,. 



