1862-64 
GORILLAS 
147 
Chaillu. It is so good, so superior to his earlier 
letters, so full of fire, noble, and self-sacrificing 
resolution, that I shall read it as our opening 
niorceau at the Geographical, November 12. 
‘ He tells me he has sent to the British Museum 
many insects, butterflies, &c., &c., and twenty 
gorillas, and a live one for the Zoological. You 
have probably heard too. He was just going off 
into the vast interior with a stout heart and in 
good spirits at having been replenished with his 
scientific instruments. 
‘ Never were we more in the right than when 
We stood up for this fine little fellow.’ 
A few weeks later, arrived some African articles 
from M. Du Chaillu for Owen himself. These con- 
sisted of a number of mats, a piece of native cloth, 
R drum, and a kind of harp, ‘ a well-made but 
primitive instrument. The piece of skin which is 
stretched over the wood-work is an elephant’s ear.’ 
With such incessant work on his hands, Owen 
'vould have been more than human if he had 
altogether escaped illness. At the close of 1863 
on December 28 — he writes to Mr. White 
Cooper : ‘ For a wonder (and I can’t be suffi- 
ciently thankful for having been free so many 
years), I am tied to my house by sciatica in the 
^cft limb, which keeps me awake half the night. 
• • • Poor Thackeray’s departure was a sorrow- 
ful shock to me ; I had been greeted by him only 
the Friday previously at the club.’ 
