RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION 371 



accountably absent from surroundings which, so 

 far as can be ascertained, are in all respects 

 favourable to their establishment and well-being. 

 It seems not to have occurred to zoologists that 

 means might be found in our great game reserves 

 to introduce and acclimatise many species at 

 present unknown in them caught in and imported 

 from other and not dissimilar regions where they 

 may seem to be growing rarer. What, for ex- 

 ample, would there be, save the mere question of 

 expense, to prevent the capture and turning down 

 of the Congo buffalo in the lower levels of the Sabi 

 Reserve, or the introduction of a pair of pygmy 

 hippopotami from Liberia into the waters of the 

 rivers flowing through the same admirably con- 

 ducted refuge ? Nothing could exceed the in- 

 terest of such experiments as these, nor their 

 value from almost every conceivable point of view. 

 To my mind a game reserve should be con- 

 ducted more or less upon the lines of a carefully 

 tended botanical garden. That is to say, it should 

 be made the scene of the propagation and pro- 

 tection not only of the animals which it contained 

 at the outset, but of every African beast from north, 

 south, east, or west which might be induced to 

 live and multiply within its limits. I trust the 

 day may still be in store for the fauna of Africa 

 when every European Sphere of Influence par- 

 ticipating in the development of that great con- 

 tinent will possess not only well-organised reserves 

 for the preservation of their game, but a regular 

 system of exchange of the various animals for the 

 purpose gradually of widening the distribution of 



