until calmed by the laughing assurance of our men, that
white people do not eat black folks; a joke haying oftentimes
greater influence in Africa than solemn assertions.
Some of our young swells, on entering an African village,
might experience a collapse of self-inflation, at the sight of
all the pretty girls fleeing from them, as from hideous
cannibals; or by witnessing, as we have done, the. conversion
of themselves into public hobgoblins, the mammas holding
naughty children away from them, and saying “ Be good, or
I shall call the white man to bite you.”
| The scent of man is excessively terrible; to game of all
kinds, much more so, probably, than the sight of him. A
herd of antelopes, a hundred yards off, gazed at us as we
moved along the winding path, and timidly stood their ground
until half our line had passed, but darted off the instant they
“ got the wind,” or caught the flavour of those who had gone
by. The sport is all up with the hunter who gets to the
windward of the African beast, as it cannot stand even
the distant aroma of the human race, so much dreaded
by all wild animals. Is this the fear and the dread of man,
which the Almighty said to Noah was to be upon every
beast of the field ? A lion may, while lying in wait for his
prey, leap on a human being as he would on any other animal,
save a rhinoceros or an elephant, that happened to pass; or a
lioness, when she has cubs, might attack a man, who, passing
“ up the wind of her,” had unconsciously, by his scent,
alarmed her for the safety of her whelps; or buffaloes, and
other animals, might rush at a line of travellers, in apprehension
of being surrounded by them; but neither beast nor snake
will, as a general rule, turn on man except when wounded,
or by mistake. I f gorillas, unwounded, advance to do battle
with him, and beat their breasts in defiance, they are an
exception to all wild beasts known to us. From the way
an elephant runs at the first glance of man, it is inferred
that this huge brute, though really king of beasts, would run
even from a child.
Our two donkeys caused as much admiration as the three
white men. Great was the astonishment when one of the
donkeys began to bray. The timid jumped more than if a lion
had roared beside them. All were startled, and stared in
mute amazement at the harsh-voiced one, till the last broken
note was uttered; then, on being assured that nothing in
particular was meant, they looked at each other, and burst
into a loud laugh at their common surprise. When one donkey
stimulated the other to try his vocal powers, the interest
felt by the startled visitors, must have equalled that of the
Londoners, when they first crowded to see the famous
hippopotamus.