Paul Du Chaillu 



283 



F 



tomsof the People, and of the 

 Chase of the Gorilla, Croc- 

 odile, Leopard, Elephant, 

 Hippopotamus, and other 

 Animals. By Paul B. Du 

 Chaillu, with Map and Illus- 

 trations. Harper & Bros., 

 1 86 1." In his preface he 

 states : 



' ' I traveled — always on 

 foot, and unaccompanied by 

 other white men — about 

 8,000 miles. I shot, stuffed, 

 and brought home over 2, 000 

 birds, of which more than 60 

 are new species, and I killed 

 upwards of 1,000 quadru- 

 peds, of which 200 were 

 stuffed and brought home, 

 with more than 80 hitherto 

 unknown to science. I suf- 

 ered fifty attacks of the 

 African fever, taking, to 

 cure myself, more than four- 

 teen ounces of quinine. Of 

 famine, long-continued ex- 

 posures to the heavy tropical 

 rains, and attacks of fero- 

 cious ants and venomous 

 flies, it is not worth while 

 to speak. 



' ' My two most severe and 

 trying tasks were the trans- 

 portation of my numerous 

 specimens to the seashore 

 and the keeping of a daily 

 journal, both of which involved more 

 painful care than I like even to think 

 of." 



In the book he told of gorilla, of 

 which he had brought back the first 

 specimens and which he had been the 

 first white man to see and hunt ; of the 

 fierce cannibal tribes, the Fans, who 

 filed their teeth to keep them sharp ; of 

 the ravages of the Baskouay ants, which 

 marched in dense columns miles in 

 length, and who were marshalled by 

 officers and generals ; of hunting ele- 

 phants with pitfalls ; of a new variety 



Courtesy of Charles Scribner's Sous 



Paul Du Chaillu 

 Born July 31, 1835 ; Died April 30, 1903 



of snake, less than four feet long and 

 six and eight inches thick, which lies in 

 the open places in the woods and whose 

 bite is instantaneous death, and of many 

 other equally wonderful sights. 



The book was greeted with shouts of 

 laughter and derision from one end of 

 the American continent to the other. 

 Mr and Mrs and Miss Gorilla was the 

 common jest, and the name Du Chaillu 

 became a byword for a fanciful story- 

 teller. Du Chaillu was only 26 when 

 his first book was published. He was 

 unable to answer satisfactorily the storm 



