Page:In brightest Africa.djvu/181

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.
  • inghame hunted elephants for ivory, and when a man

approaches a herd looking for ivory, he is not likely to see much excepting tusks. It is natural, therefore, that from the ivory hunters we learn comparatively little of the more intimate things that we should like to know about the every-day life of the elephant. The world has no record of the knowledge of wild life that their experience should have given the ivory hunters.

It is for this reason that the camera hunters appeal to me as being so much more useful than the gun hunters. They have their pictures to show—still pictures and moving pictures—and when their game is over the animals are still alive to play another day. Moreover, according to any true conception of sport—the use of skill, daring, and endurance in overcoming difficulties—camera hunting takes twice the man that gun hunting takes. It is fortunate for the animals that camera hunting is becoming popular.

The first notable camera hunter in Africa was Edward North Buxton, whose book, "Two African Trips," was published in 1902. In the preface to this book Buxton writes that "it would better be described as a picture-book than a volume of travels." This book paved the way for another in 1905, "With Flashlight and Rifle," by C. G. Schillings. Considering the state of photography at that time, Schillings' book is a truly remarkable record of wild animal life. In 1910, A. Radclyffe Dugmore brought out his book, "Camera Adventures in the African Wilds." In it are several pictures of lions taken by flashlight at night