March 27, 1908] 



SCIENCE 



499 



some of the small lakes of the Kilimanjaro 

 region, where hippopotami disported at as 

 close quarters as in a zoological garden — to 

 the observer, who was of course hidden ; the 

 only bird-song heard which suggested Europe 

 was that of the African nightingale, the 

 northern relative of which has been known to 

 nest in Africa; seven pounds of stones and 

 pebbles were taken from the stomach of a 

 crocodile, and the author suggests that they 

 are swallowed as an aid in sinking, but must 

 these animals then regurgitate ballast when- 

 ever they wish to rise? The swamp-pools 

 harbor an almost incredible number of &h, 

 in spite of the hosts of fish-eating birds and 

 crocodiles which prey upon them. Here no 

 doubt is a great store of new and interesting 

 material awaiting the ichthyologist. The ele- 

 phants are not dependent upon grass, but will 

 literally strip a tree of its bark or of its 

 branches when hard pressed, and are some- 

 times found in company with the giraffe, the 

 most timid of all the big animals, which never 

 fights unless surrounded. The writer thinks 

 that the okapi is certain to survive its larger 

 relative. The largest tusks of the African 

 elephant yet recorded came from German East 

 Africa, weighed together 450 pounds, and 

 were sold to an American for five thousand 

 dollars. The rhinoceros not only occasionally 

 breaks a horn, but sheds both of its ponderous 

 weapons at intervals, whether in freedom or 

 in captivity. The organ shrilve, which sings 

 under the blazing sun of midday, mates for 

 life. The question is asked why the eyes of 

 beasts of prey shine out in the darkness, and 

 the author remarks that he has " never been 

 able to get any precise scientific explanation 

 of the phenomenon." We supposed that the 

 eyes of no animal ever shone in absolute dark- 

 ness, and that the glistening so often seen 

 and recorded by the camera was solely due 

 to the interference of reflected light in that 

 peculiar layer of the choroid coat called the 

 tapetum lucidum, and which the eye of the cat 

 or the dog illustrates as perfectly as that of a 

 lion or hyena. 



We share the writer's admiration for Presi- 

 dent Roosevelt, when he speaks of his efforts 

 for the preservation of game in America, but 



thinli he is in error when he adds : " The estab- 

 lishment of the Yellowstone National Park 

 was largely the President's work," since this 

 park was dedicated in 1872, when our presi- 

 dent was a lad of fifteen, and enlarged in 

 1891, or ten years before he entered the White 

 House. 



The destruction of wild animals, at first, no 

 doubt, a necessity, seems to have become a 

 confirmed habit if not a second nature of the 

 Boers, their only contribution to zoology thus 

 far being a lot of ugly and ridiculous names. 

 Thus the gnu is called " wildebeest " ; the cow- 

 antelope " hartbeest," because it is tenacious 

 of life ; the hyena was called the " wolf," and 

 the giraffe the " kameel " ! 



Herr Schillings was wont to resort to cer- 

 tain hilltops and tall trees from which, as 

 from an observatory, he coiild watch the pano- 

 rama of wild life unfold upon the plains. The 

 numbers and variety of animals which some- 

 times passed under his eye were wonderful. 

 He has drawn many striking pictures of the 

 shifting scenes of this wilderness-drama, and 

 the reader will enjoy his vivid descriptions of 

 the velt under the changing lights, and the 

 varying sounds of the forest at all times of 

 the day and night. 



In the two concluding chapters Schillings 

 describes the difficulties of photography in a 

 country in which water is often the greatest 

 of all luxuries, as precious as life itself, even 

 when obtained from small mud-pools, where 

 everything " undulates and shimmers, bathed 

 in a dazzling sea of light," where light-colored 

 objects often appear deep black, where dis- 

 tances are so deceptive that when but a few 

 hundred paces away it is often impossible to 

 distinguish a rhinoceros from an ostrich or 

 the termites' nest, and where the labors of the 

 night worker are usually rewarded by a fresh 

 attack of malarial fever. In most of the 

 cases of flashlight photography the animals 

 were made to take their own pictures at 

 favorite drinking pools, or around some bait 

 or lure, by means of strings secured to up- 

 right stakes and to the camera. For success 

 the flash must be powerful; it must be abso- 

 lutely simultaneous with the exposure, and the 

 right animal must fire the charge and come 



