185 
REVIEWS. 
M. 13U CHAILLU’S AFRICAN DISCOVERIES.* 
A TRAVELLER who writes an account of his explorations, has two serious 
difficulties to contend against : if he narrates anything very extraordinary 
people are apt to he sceptical as to his love of truth, and if the incidents of 
his history approach the commonplace he is not unusually said to he dull. 
Unhappily for M. Du Chaillu, his work on u Equatorial Africa ” met with 
a good deal of opposition from sceptical naturalists, hut we think that in the 
volume he has now given us he has surmounted the obstacles we have re- 
ferred to. He does not tell us “a more wonderful tale,” nor is his narra- 
tive devoid of interest either to the geographer or the zoologist. The object, 
the author tells us, with which he set out upon the expedition, whose re- 
sults he has now recorded, was to substantiate the statements which he 
made in his first work. He felt hurt by the u unfair and ungenerous 
criticisms ” which were passed upon his first work, and he determined, by 
supplying himself with an extensive series of scientific apparatus, and re- 
turning to Africa, to put his assertions beyond all question. Such were 
the author’s intentions on setting out a second time to explore that portion 
of Africa which lies immediately below the equator. M. Du Chaillu 
thought that, by ascertaining with astronomical exactitude the posi- 
tion of the several points visited by him in his travels, he should thus 
prevent any of those insinuations with which he was so abundantly assailed 
on his first appearance as an African explorer. This was why he took with 
him upon his last voyage a number of philosophical instruments, for es- 
timating the height, temperature, longitude, &c., of each portion of the 
country which he visited. It is to be regretted, therefore, that his antici- 
pations in regard to the employment of these implements of research were 
not fully carried out. In his first disembarkation his boat was upset, and 
those of his astronomical instruments which were not lost were rendered 
quite unfit for scientific use through the corrosive action of the salt water. 
It is not our aim to follow M. Du Chaillu in his various wanderings from 
the moment he left the coast till he arrived in the land of the Ashangui. 
In the portion of his book especially devoted to the record of his progress 
from day to day among the natives, M. Du Chaillu does not provide a more 
interesting literary bill of fare than other writers on African travel. There 
are the same endless disputes with the natives, and the old trick of cultivat- 
ing diplomatic relations with hoary chieftains, through the assistance of a 
* “ A Journey to Ashango Land, and further Penetration into Equatorial 
Africa.” By Paul P. Du Chaillu. London : Murray. 1867. 
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