HAMLYN’S 
Unfortunately this otherwise successful 
expedition was marred by the death of one 
of the two “profiteers,” who was killed by a 
lion near Rutshuru, in the Belgian Congo, 
during the return journey, they having camped 
there for a few days in order to secure some 
lion skins and cubs if possible before leaving 
the Congo. 
_ There is little doubt that the public (with 
a very few exceptions) who spend a pleasant 
afternoon at the Zoo gazing at the animals 
in their cages have no idea of the difficulties 
and dangers incurred in coping with these 
animals in their natural haunts, and we ven- 
ture the opinion that your representative who 
Writes about “profiteering” in the jungle has 
yet a great deal to learn about his subject. 
Possibly profiteering is carried on in con- 
nexion with buying and selling animals, but 
to describe this as “profiteering in the tropi- 
cal jungle” tends to give the public the idea 
that the man who actually hunts the animals 
is the profiteer, whereas the hunter merely 
sells his specimens to the highest bidder. 
There are various agents in every coun- 
try who buy up animals from natives and 
others in order to sell them again to zoologi- 
cal societies and colelctors, but these gentle- 
men are not to be found in the jung!e, but in 
the towns in close proximity thereto, and 
whether or not their dealings can be des- 
cribed as profiteering is not for us to say, but 
we would remind the writer of your article 
that prices out here for all necessities have 
gone up enormously since the Armistice, and 
there is no doubt that this is due to a great 
extent to profiteering at home, and would 
Suggest to him that he would be making better 
use of his pen if he left us in the jungles 
alone and turned his attention to those well- 
fed and well-housed profiteers at his own 
doorstep, who by their dealings are doing 
the country incalculable harm. 
We are Sir, yours, etc., 
ss Zoological Societies have no idea of the ex- 
» Penses incurred by the ordinary dealer in collect- 
_ img animals, beasts, birds and reptiles. 
_ Unfortunately for the dealer, these Societies 
_feceive exceptional treatment, firstly as regards 
| €s0t of animals abroad, secondly low charges of 
" freightage, and finally the recompense to those on 
steamer. - 
: I have had forty years knowledge of shipping 
_ and speak from experience over that time. 
FOUR JUNGLE PROFITEERS? 
MENAGERIE MAGAZINE. 59 
The freightage now from South Africa is 
140/- per ton for birds and 180/- for animals. 
Directly these Societies, with the assistance 
of the general public, can persuade the Union 
Castle Mail Co. to reduce their charges, well and 
good. 
Let me inform all and sundry that instead of 
stock getting cheaper, the prices will be con- 
siderably higher in the future. 
The Profiteers are the Steamship Companies 
who, holding a monopoly, charge traders any price 
they like. 
It is unlimited blackmail pure and simple. 
J.D. He 
——§——_ 
~Baboons in South Africa. 
DRIVEN: TO DESPERATION: BY 
DROUGHT. 
In a particularly mountainous part of the 
Oudtshoorn district around the farms, known as 
Vergelegen, lying some 20 miles from the town, 
baboons have been increasing to an enormous ex- 
tent during the last few years, writes an Ount- 
shoorn correspondent. They have become not 
only defiant in their attitude towards their superior 
cousins, but have actually attacked them at a 
lonely spot in the veld where the road winds up 
hill and down dale. A baboon has followed the 
ordinary Cape cart of a farmer, and in such a 
menacing way that a man, unprotected by fire- 
arms, has thought discretion the better part of 
valour, and so whipped up his horses and got 
out of range of the big brute, which, expelled 
from the troop on account of senility, has tried 
to vent his spite on human beings. On another 
occasion the self-same Simian possibly has tried 
to pull a young cyclist from his machine in the 
same vicinity, and round about these parts the 
farmers will seldom venture into the veld without 
specially trained baboon-dogs or firearms. 
Owing to the drought the baboon finds that 
it is difficult to live. There are no crops grow- 
ing, while the succulent bulbs and berries have 
been either so depleted or dried up that he is at 
his wits end to keep body and—tail together. He 
has taken to killing young ostriches which he 
may Come upon in the ostrich camps, which are 
within striking distance of his strongholds. The 
young chicks are ripped open by his strong finger 
and he has a good meal off a month old chick. 
Ostrich chicks however, with the boom in feathers 
