ADVENTURES ON MT. MIKENO
The day after I shot my first gorilla on the slopes of Mikeno I spent
in camp. I should have preferred to spend it resting, for the day
before had been a strenuous one, especially for a man suffering from
blood poisoning, as I was. I had had it for some time and had lost
about twenty pounds during the preceding three weeks. This left me in
a weakened condition and a rest would have been welcome. Had I been
hunting merely to kill I should have laid off a day. But science is
a jealous mistress and takes little account of a man's feelings. I
had skinned the old gorilla roughly in the field the day before. If I
wanted properly to preserve the specimen, there was no time to be lost.
I set the Negroes at work cleaning the skeleton, keeping an eye on them
as I worked at other things to see that they did not lose any of the
bones. I had personally to take care of the feet, hands, and head. This
latter I set up and photographed. Then I made a death mask of the face.
The brains and internal organs I had to preserve in formalin. The whole
business was a full hard day's work. One of the chief difficulties with
scientific collecting is the necessity for doing all the skinning,
cleaning, measuring, and preserving at once. For one man one gorilla
properly attended to is a full day's work. If a man gets two or three
specimens, he has to keep working night and day until he gets them done.
This is one of the reasons why, although great numbers of animals
are shot in Africa, there is so comparatively little scientific and
taxidermical data about them. This day I was up about daybreak. I had
an English breakfast, most of which had come from London with me--tea,
toast, marmalade, and bacon. From then until dark I measured and
skinned and preserved, and when night came I rolled into my blankets
and slept the sleep of exhaustion.
When daybreak came I was ready to start again. Had I felt certain of
finding gorillas in that country as easily as I now know they can be
found I might have waited a day. But I had come 15,000 miles to see
gorillas and I couldn't wait for the fulfillment of my hopes, nor did
the ease of finding my first prize assure me that I was certain of
getting the others I wanted.
We set out in the same direction as on the previous hunt. In the woods
on these mountain sides the ground growth is extremely thick, and
as high up as we went there were no elephant or other paths. It was
necessary to go through the woods. The natives' method of travelling
is to cut a trail as they proceed. They used a hooked knife of great
effectiveness with which to cut the undergrowth. The stuff is thick
enough to impede one's progress, but far worse than that it is filled
with nettles, so that unless it is cut out in this way one is
constantly and unmercifully stung. That is bad enough for a white man
who is clothed, but is even worse for the blacks who wear nothing to
protect them. Nevertheless, cutting as they go, the natives make pretty
good time, perhaps two miles an hour up hill and down. Anyway, I found
that I had all I could do to keep up with them; weak as I was, I had
frequently to slow them down.
In this way we had passed over several ridges when we came on the trail
of a band of gorillas. The trail they make is plain enough, for the
undergrowth is so thick that each of the animals leaves a kind of swath
of bent and broken greenery. Their trail led us along the side of a
steep slope, so steep that every move had to be made with caution. If
the gorilla was in the habit of travelling either far or fast, catching
up with him in this country would be a heart-breaking if not an
impossible task. But I believe the gorilla normally travels only from
three to five miles a day. He loafs along through the forest, eating
as he goes. As the trail we found was fresh it was likely that the
gorillas were not far away. And so it turned out. We had followed for
perhaps an hour when a dislodged rock thundering down into the chasm
about two hundred yards ahead of us gave a clue to their whereabouts,
and so we sat tight and soon located them by moving bushes, across a
bit of a bay formed by a curve of the ridge. There I saw a big female
and very foolishly tried a shot with the Springfield. I suppose in
justification of my lack of faith in the thing it missed fire twice and
by the time I got the big gun in hand the female had disappeared and a
big silver-backed male was in sight.
He was about 150 yards away. He was just disappearing when I got the
big gun to my shoulder and I had to shoot quickly. I fired and missed.
They disappeared, and I fully appreciated what an ass I had been. We
scrambled on for an hour more--the hillside becoming higher and more
precipitous every minute. At last a slight movement of the bush above
made us aware of their presence.
The fact that we came up with them again after my shooting was pretty
good evidence that even when disturbed the gorilla does not travel
either far or fast. The experience I had had with my first gorilla two
days before corroborated this. He had, in fact, run only about 300
yards after first seeing us before stopping. As a matter of fact, I do
not believe that the gorilla can run fast. Unlike animals that catch
others for food, the gorilla, who eats vegetation, does not have to run
for his dinner. Neither does he have to run to escape serving as dinner
for some other animals. His legs, compared to his weight, are small
and, in relation to man's, very short. On fair footing I think the
average man could outrun a gorilla.
Where we came in sight of this band there was no friendly tree to
lean against as there had been in the case of the first gorilla. The
hillside was so steep that it was difficult to find footing from which
to shoot. For a slight sense of security I entangled myself in a bush
and stood ready to shoot.
There was not the straight drop of the other day but a steep slope
which could be done on all fours--for twenty feet--and then straight
down two hundred feet. I got a fair sight of an old black female and it
looked as though the bushes she was in would hold her if I killed her
instantly. She was fifty feet away. I fired and she came exactly as the
other one had--the slope was so steep it was practically a fall--and
straight at me. I tried to dodge but could not as the recoil of the gun
had caused me to lose my balance a bit and I could not recover in time.
I threw myself flat, face down, just in time and she passed over me.
It was so steep and the mass of green stuff going with her so softened
things that I merely felt her--there was no perceptible shock, but when
I got up I had a great welt on the top of my head which she had caused.
As I partially rose there seemed to be an avalanche of gorillas. There
was a big ball of black fur, squealing madly, rolling past--actually
touching me--in the wake of the old one. I took a shot at it as it went
over, and, by the time I had recovered and reloaded, two others that
had been close by had disappeared.
I believe that to be the fastest charge ever made by a gorilla against
man. I think it was pushed home with more abandon than any other on
record. I am almost certain of these two statements, the particular
reason for my certainty being that the gorilla, when she charged or
more correctly speaking fell down the hill, was dead and she couldn't
have any of the hesitations which I believe prevent such charges
by live gorillas. The others followed her not in anger but in fear
and because they accepted her lead without realizing that it was
involuntary. If their charge had been aimed at me they had plenty of
time to knock me off the mountain side before I could get up and shoot
again, and the Negroes, being armed only with spears and hanging on a
precipitous slope, were almost as defenceless.
I began to feel a good deal of confidence in my theory that the gorilla
is not a ferocious beast, although I was gaining the utmost respect
for his size and power. If being molested by man would make gorillas
ferocious and aggressive, these animals should have been excessively
dangerous, for within a very short time the Prince of Sweden had shot
fourteen of them, and Barnes had killed several more. The very animals
that I followed had probably heard the guns of these other men. Yet I
could see no signs of ferocity. When I came up with the old male that
I had killed first, he had run back and forth on the hillside barking
in protest or surprise at my intrusion just as I have seen little
monkeys run back and forth on a limb and bark; but of his having savage
intentions against me I saw no sign. Of the two I was the savage and
the aggressor. In the case of the female I had just shot, the same
was true, even though she was accompanied by her baby. She evidently
preferred to get away if possible. Cornered, I think and hope she would
fight for her young.
What became of the last two animals I do not know. The black fur ball
that I had fired at was, I believe, the four-year-old son of the old
female. He apparently caught on somewhere, for a half hour later when
we were trying to find a way down we came across him and, as he ran
about, one of the guides speared him. I came up before he was dead.
There was a heartbreaking expression of piteous pleading on his face.
He would have come to my arms for comfort.
About this time the chasm filled with a fog so dense that we could not
move with safety. Another half hour and the fog was cleared by a heavy
cold rain and hail and we continued to search for a way down to the
dead gorilla. The Negroes had worked earnestly, but they gave up and
said it could not be done. Poor devils, they were stark naked in that
icy rain; God knows how they lived through it. When they gave up they
gave up for good apparently, stood shaking with cold, making no effort
to find shelter from the rain. I took off my Burberry raincoat and got
seven of them under it with me.
In such proximity to seven naked natives almost all of my senses were
considerably oppressed and I was grateful when the rain lessened
so that I might put them at a more respectful as well as a more
comfortable distance. The others had huddled under an old tree root.
All came out and we looked over the situation. We were on the side
of a ridge of Mikeno. Where we were there was vegetation and a fair
foothold. Below and above us were stretches of sheer rock. Not far from
us a little stream fell off the shelf where we were, in a clear fall
of 200 feet. The gorilla was somewhere near the bottom of that fall.
The natives insisted that it was impossible to get to the dead animal.
To go straight down was impossible. But I felt that there might be a
chance to work along sideways in a patch of vegetation until we could
get down to a lower level. By working back and forth on the face of the
mountain side in this way I hoped to reach the dead gorilla. However,
I soon realized that if I wanted to try this somewhat hazardous
experiment I should have to lead the way, for the blacks had nothing
greater than a few days' wages at stake while I had one of the prizes
of a long and expensive expedition. So I swung down on the overhanging
roots of a tree and began the descent with the natives following. It
took a surprisingly long time for us to get down the 200 feet, and it
finally turned out that the route that I took led off to one side where
I could not reach the gorilla when I had descended to her level. Twenty
or thirty feet farther down I managed to cross to the stream-bed and
then went up the stream to the bottom of the falls and from there to
where the body lay. Where the stream-bed was steepest, we literally had
the water falling on our heads as we scrambled up.
It was a tough job skinning and skeletonizing her. In the first place,
I was tired and she was heavy, and in the second place if she was
turned over with anything but the utmost care she was likely to roll
off down into the chasm below. Nor could I get much assistance from
the boys, for there was only room enough for a man or two to help.
However, in some manner we managed a satisfactory job in everything
but one particular. The camera boy had come down but the tripod carrier
never appeared. If it had been an ordinary camera the loss of the
tripod would have made little difference, but it was the moving-picture
camera, and a moving-picture camera without a tripod is useless.
It was well past mid-afternoon when the skin and bones were ready to
move to camp.
As I worked I had kept wondering how we were ever to get up out of the
chasm, especially with the added burdens we had acquired. I am still
wondering how we did get out. The "human fly" was no more remarkable
than those black boys. My heart was in my mouth for an hour watching
them work their way up the almost perpendicular wall of that chasm with
the skin and skeleton. We got to camp just before dark in a pouring
rain, and I am free to confess that during the last hour I several
times doubted if I should get in. It was beyond doubt the toughest day
I ever spent. Never again--not for all the gorillas and museums in the
world. I spent the next day in camp working on the two specimens--the
female and the baby that had been speared--and finally had three
beautiful gorilla skins all safe under the fly of my tent. They were so
well assorted that they would make a very satisfactory group if I got
no more. I had death masks of each and skeletons of the two old ones;
but the four-year-old, a vigorous young male, I skinned with infinite
care and preserved the entire carcass with formalin and salt--a
precious anatomical record for sculptural and taxidermic use.
The gun boys and guides came the following morning and said they were
going home. It took an hour, money, and many promises to make them
change their minds. Heaven knows I did not blame them. I would not do
what they had done for money.
However, I did not start again. Although I had worked one whole day on
the last two gorillas I had some things still to do and I felt that
with enough material on hand for a good group even if I got no more I
could go a bit easier. So I stayed in camp another day and planned a
gorilla hunt for the moving-picture camera. On the side hills where we
had been hunting there was no possible hope of using a camera so I told
the boys if they took me in any such places again I would annihilate
them. Not only would it be useless for the camera but I felt that I
couldn't stand another such trip myself. So they promised me an easier
route, and equipped with photographic outfit we started off in the
direction of the Saddle between Mikeno and Karisimbi. It seemed a very
stiff climb to me in the beginning, but I have learned since that it
was chiefly because of my extreme weakness. Before I had been out an
hour I was sorely tempted to return to camp and give it up; but we came
upon a fresh trail of a band of gorillas which for some reason or other
the guides followed only a short distance, continuing on in the same
general direction in which we had started, without any encouragement,
until it seemed that we had gone to the crest of the Saddle. There,
as the result of a conference between the guides, we started in a
southerly direction intending to work in a roundabout way back to camp.
Camp was the only thing that I was interested in, for at this time I
was practically "done."
Ten minutes later the guides ducked, and crouching, came back and fell
in behind me. I took the gun from the bearer, and looking over the tops
of the greenery of a little rise in front of us I saw a spot of black
fur perhaps fifty yards ahead. As I crouched, waiting for a better
view, the animal I was watching climbed up on a nearly horizontal
branch of a tree looking back in my direction. In the meantime,
the motion-picture camera had been brought to my side. I raised it
carefully, put it in position, and all this time another larger gorilla
was making the ascent of the horizontal branch of the tree. It was
apparently an old mother and her two-year-old baby. Almost before I
knew it I was turning the crank of the camera on two gorillas in full
view with a beautiful setting behind them. I do not think at the time
that I appreciated the fact that I was doing a thing that had never
been done before. As I ground away, a second baby came scrambling up a
near-by tree. The baby seemed very much interested in the operation.
The mother professed indifference and a certain amount of boredom and
after a bit pretended to lie down on one arm and go to sleep. The
babies, one of them at least, seemed to be amused. He would stand
up, fold his arms and slap them against his breast, which suggested
uproarious laughter on his part.
When I had turned off about one hundred feet with my heart in my mouth
for fear the thing would come to an end too soon, I realized that I had
as much of that particular subject as I wanted, there being no great
amount of movement. So I changed the two-inch lens for the six-inch
lens in order to make a "closeup." When I had taken about three hundred
feet I felt that I would like a change of scene; so with my hand on the
camera I stood up straight and tried to start a conversation with them.
They all bolted.
It was amazing what an effect that minute or two of experience had
on me physically. I forgot my weariness and took up the trail. For
the next hour we followed them, getting glimpses of them frequently.
There were probably ten or twelve in the band; but never again did I
get the opportunity to photograph them--just little glimpses of black
fur dodging about through the greenery. At one time with my glasses I
watched them across a ravine for a considerable time. The old female
was lying down on her back yawning and stretching, but she was too
far away for a photograph. So finally, feeling that I had about all I
could expect from that band, I picked out one that I thought to be an
immature male. I shot and killed it and found, much to my regret, that
it was a female. As it turned out, however, she was such a splendid
large specimen that the feeling of regret was considerably lessened.
This female had a baby which was hustled off by the rest of the band.
The baby was crying piteously as it went.
This, added to the specimens on hand, brought the material for the
group to one old male, two females, and a young male of about four
years of age.
That night as I came into camp my mind went back to a certain day
eleven years before when I was hunting lions on the Uasin Gishu
Plateau with a moving-picture camera. A most wonderful opportunity
had then been given me. Full in front of me the native hunters had
drawn a lion's charge and killed the lion with their spears. But the
opportunity had been as short-lived as it was magnificent, and the
kind of camera I had then could not be handled that quickly. As I
walked back to camp that night, I was determined to make a naturalist's
moving-picture camera that would prevent my missing such a chance if
ever such a one came my way again. From 1910 to 1916 I worked on this
camera whenever I had a minute to spare. By 1917 I had the pleasure
of knowing that it was used on observation planes destined for the
battlefields of France. I had myself never had a chance to try my
invention, except experimentally, until this trip to Africa. On this
expedition I had brought two--a large one for panorama work and a
smaller one nicknamed "the Gorilla" for animal work. "The Gorilla" had
taken 300 feet of film of the animal that had heretofore never been
taken alive in its native wilds by any camera, still or moving. Few
things have given me greater satisfaction than the realization that
the failure of 1910 had led directly to the success of 1921.
To make assurance doubly sure, as night came on I had a fire made
in the door of my tent and comforted by its warmth I took a little
piece of the end of the film and developed it. It was all right. I
took another sample from the middle. It, too, came out strong. I was
satisfied--more satisfied than a man ever should be--but I revelled in
the feeling.