Part 3

A group of thirty or forty of the most famous zoologists and sportsmen presented my father with a heavy, double-barrelled gun. “At last I have tried the double-barrelled Holland Elephant rifle. It is a perfect beauty and it shoots very accurately, but of course the recoil is tremendous, and I fired very few shots. I shall get you to fire it two or three times at a target after we reach Africa, just so that you shall be thoroughly familiar with it, if, or when, you use it after big game. There is no question that except under extraordinary circumstances it would be the best weapon for elephant, rhino, and buffalo. I think the 405 Winchester will be as good for everything else.”

“About all my African things are ready now, or will be in a few days. I suppose yours are in good trim also [a surreptitious dig at a somewhat lackadaisical son.] I am pursuing my usual plan of taking all the precautions in advance.”

A few days later came another reference to the Holland & Holland: “The double-barrelled four-fifty shot beautifully, but I was paralyzed at the directions which accompanied it to the effect that two shots must always be fired in the morning before starting, as otherwise from the freshly oiled barrels the first shot would go high. This is all nonsense and I shall simply have to see that the barrels are clean of the oil.” The recoil of the big gun was so severe that it became a standing joke as to whether we did not fear it more than a charging elephant!

Father gave the closest attention to every detail of the equipment. The first provision lists prepared by his friends in England were drawn up on a presidential scale with champagne and pâté de foies gras and all sorts of luxuries. These were blue-pencilled and two American staples substituted--baked beans and canned tomatoes. Father always retained the appreciation of canned tomatoes gained in the early ranching days in the West. He would explain how delicious he had found it in the Bad Lands after eating the tomatoes to drink the juice from the can. In hunting in a temperate climate such as our West, a man can get along with but very little, and it is difficult to realize that a certain amount of luxury is necessary in the tropics to maintain oneself fit. Then, too, in Africa the question of transportation was fairly simple--and almost everywhere we were able to keep ourselves and the porters amply supplied with fresh meat. Four years later during the descent of the Dúvida--the “River of Doubt”--we learned to our bitter cost what it meant to travel in the tropics as lightly equipped as one could, with but little hardship, in the north. It was not, however, through our own lack of forethought, but due rather to the necessities and shifting chances of a difficult and dangerous exploring expedition.

Even if it is true as Napoleon said, that an army marches on its belly, still, it won’t go far unless its feet are properly shod, and since my father had a skin as tender as a baby’s, he took every precaution that his boots should fit him properly and not rub. “The modified duffle-bags came all right. I suppose we will get the cotton-soled shoes, but I do not know. How do you like the rubber-soled shoes? Don’t you think before ordering other pairs it would be as well to wait until you see the army shoes here, which are light and somehow look as if they were more the kind you ordinarily use? How many pairs have you now for the African trip, and how many more do you think you want?”

Father was fifty years old in the October before we left for Africa, and the varied experiences of his vigorous life had, as he used to say, battered and chipped him. One eye was to all intents useless from the effects of a boxing-match, and from birth he had been so astigmatic as to be absolutely unable to use a rifle and almost unable to find his way in the woods without his glasses. He never went off without eight or ten pairs so distributed throughout his kit as to minimize the possibility of being crippled through any ordinary accident. Even so, any one who has worn glasses in the tropics knows how easily they fog over, and how hopeless they are in the rains. It was a continual source of amazement to see how skilfully father had discounted this handicap in advance and appeared to be unhampered by it.

Another serious threat lay in the leg that had been injured when the carriage in which he was driving was run down by a trolley-car, and the secret service man with him was killed. In September, 1908, he wrote me from Washington: “I have never gotten over the effects of the trolley-car accident six years ago, when, as you will remember, they had to cut down to the shin bone. The shock permanently damaged the bone, and if anything happens there is always a chance of trouble which would be serious. Before I left Oyster Bay, while riding, I got a rap on the shin bone from a branch. This was either the cause or the occasion of an inflammation, which had grown so serious when I got back here that Doctor Rixey had to hastily take it in hand. For a couple of days it was uncertain whether we would not have to have another operation and remove some of the bones of the leg, but fortunately the doctor got it in hand all right, and moreover it has enabled me to learn just what I ought to do if I am threatened with similar trouble in Africa.”

His activity, however, was little hampered by his leg, for a few weeks later he wrote: “I have done very little jumping myself, and that only of the small jumps up to four feet, because it is evident that I have got to be pretty careful of my leg, and that an accident of at all a serious character might throw me out of gear for the African trip. This afternoon by the way, Archie Butt and I took a scramble down Rock Creek. It was raining and the rocks were slippery, and at one point I slipped off into the creek, but merely bruised myself in entirely safe places, not hurting my leg at all. When we came to the final and stiffest cliff climb, it was so dark that Archie couldn’t get up.” From which it may be seen that neither endurance nor skill suffered as a result of the accident to the leg. Still, as Bret Harte says, “We always wink with the weaker eye,” and when anything went wrong, the leg was sure to be implicated. Father suffered fearfully with it during the descent of the River of Doubt. One of the most constant pictures of father that I retain is at Sagamore after dinner on the piazza. He would draw his chair out from the roofed-over part to where he could see the moon and the stars. When things were black he would often quote Jasper Petulengro in Borrow’s Lavengro: “Life is sweet, brother.... There’s day and night, brother, both sweet things; sun, moon, and stars, all sweet things; ... and likewise there’s a wind on the heath,” and would add: “Yes, there’s always the wind on the heath.” From where he sat he looked across the fields to the dark woods, and over the tree-tops to the bay with the changing twinkling lights of the small craft; across the bay to the string of lamps along the causeway leading to Centre Island, and beyond that again Long Island Sound with occasionally a “tall Fall Steamer light.” For a while father would drink his coffee in silence, and then his rocking-chair would start creaking and he would say: “Do you remember that night in the Sotik when the gun-bearers were skinning the big lion?” or “What a lovely camp that was under the big tree in the Lado when we were hunting the giant eland?”

We get three sorts and periods of enjoyment out of a hunting trip. The first is when the plans are being discussed and the outfit assembled; this is the pleasure of anticipation. The second is the enjoyment of the actual trip itself; and the third is the pleasure of retrospection when we sit round a blazing wood-fire and talk over the incidents and adventures of the trip. There is no general rule to know which of the three gives the keenest joy. I can think of a different expedition in which each sort stands out in pre-eminence. Even if the trip has been exceptionally hard and the luck unusually bad, the pleasures of anticipation and preparation cannot be taken away, and frequently the retrospect is the more satisfactory because of the difficulties and discomforts surmounted.

I think we enjoyed the African trip most in the actuality, and that is saying a great deal. It was a wonderful “adventure” and all the world seemed young. Father has quoted in the foreword to African Game Trails: “I speak of Africa and golden joys.” It was a line that I have heard him repeat to himself many times. In Africa everything was new. He revelled in the vast plains blackened with herds of grazing antelope. From his exhaustive reading and retentive memory he knew already the history and the habits of the different species of game. When we left camp in the early morning we never could foretell what we would run into by nightfall--we were prepared for anything from an elephant to a dik-dik--the graceful diminutive antelope no larger than a hare. In the evening, after we had eaten we would gather round the camp-fire--for in the highlands the evenings were chilly--and each would tell the adventures of his day, and discuss plans for the morrow. Then we would start paralleling and comparing. Father would illustrate with adventures of the old days in our West; Cuninghame from the lore gathered during his twenty years in Africa would relate some anecdote, and Mearns would talk of life among the wild tribes in the Philippines.

Colonel Mearns belonged to the medical corps in the army. He had come with us as an ornithologist, for throughout his military career he had been actively interested in sending specimens from wherever he was serving to the Smithsonian National Museum in Washington. His mild manner belied his fearless and intrepid disposition. A member of the expedition once came into camp with an account of the doctor, whom he had just run across--looking too benevolent for this world, engaged in what our companion described as “slaughtering humming-birds, pursuing them from bush to bush.” One of his Philippine adventures filled us with a delighted interest for which I don’t believe he fully appreciated the reason. He told us how with a small force he had been hemmed in by a large number of Moros. The Americans took refuge in a stockade on a hilltop. The Moros advanced time and again with the greatest gallantry, and Mearns explained how sorry he felt for them as they fell--some under the very walls of the stockade. In a musing tone at the end he added: “I slipped out of the stockade that night and collected a most interesting series of skulls; they’re in the Smithsonian to-day.”

Father was the rare combination of a born raconteur--with the gift of putting in all the little details that make a story--and an equally good listener. He was an adept at drawing people out. His interest was so whole-hearted and obvious that the shyest, most tongue-tied adventurer found himself speaking with entire freedom. Every one with whom we came in contact fell under the charm. Father invariably thought the best of a person, and for that very reason every one was at his best with him--and felt bound to justify his confidence and judgment. With him I always thought of the Scotch story of the MacGregor who, when a friend told him that it was an outrage that at a certain banquet he should have been given a seat half-way down the table, replied: “Where the MacGregor sits is the head of the table!” Where father sat was always the head of the table, and yet he treated every one with the same courtesy and simplicity, whether it was the governor of the Protectorate or the poorest Boer settler. I remember how amazed some were at the lack of formality in his relationship with the members of the expedition. Many people who have held high positions feel it incumbent on them to maintain a certain distance in their dealings with their less illustrious fellow men. If they let down the barrier they feel, they would lose dignity. They are generally right, for their superiority is not innate, but the result of chance. With father it was otherwise. The respect and consideration felt for him could not have been greater, and would certainly not have been so sincere, had he built a seven-foot barrier about himself.

He was most essentially unselfish, and wanted no more than would have been his just due if the expedition, instead of being owing entirely to him, both financially and otherwise, had been planned and carried out by all of us. He was a natural champion of the cause of every man, and not only in his books would he carefully give credit where it was due, but he would endeavor to bring about recognition through outside channels. Thus he felt that Colonel Rondon deserved wide acknowledgment for the years of exploring in the Brazilian Hinterland; and he brought it to the attention of the American and British Geographical Societies. As a result, the former awarded the gold medal to Colonel Rondon. In the same way father championed the cause of the naturalists who went with him on his expeditions. He did his best to see that the museums to which they belonged should appreciate their services, and give them the opportunity to follow the results through. When an expedition brings back material that has not been described, the museum publishes pamphlets listing the new species, and explaining their habitats and characteristics. This is rarely done by the man who did the actual collecting. Father, whenever it was feasible, arranged for the naturalists who had accompanied or taken part in the collecting to have the credit of writing the pamphlets describing the results of their work. To a layman this would not seem much, but in reality it means a great deal. Father did all he could to encourage his companions to write their experiences, for most of them had led eventful lives filled with unusual incident. When, as is often the case, the actor did not have the power of written narrative, father would be the first to recognize it, and knew that if inadequately described, the most eventful careers may be of no more interest than the catalogue of ships in the Odyssey, or the “begat” chapters in the Bible. If, however, father felt that there existed a genuine ability to write, he would spare no efforts to place the articles; in some cases he would write introductions, and in others, reviews of the book, if the results attained to that proportion.

One of the most careful preparations that father made for the African expedition was the choosing of the library. He selected as wide a range as possible, getting the smallest copy of each book that was obtainable with decent reading type. He wanted a certain number of volumes mainly for the contrast to the daily life. He told me that he had particularly enjoyed Swinburne and Shelley in ranching days in the Bad Lands, because they were so totally foreign to the life and the country--and supplied an excellent antidote to the daily round. Father read so rapidly that he had to plan very carefully in order to have enough books to last him through a trip. He liked to have a mixture of serious and light literature--chaff, as he called the latter. When he had been reading histories and scientific discussions and political treatises for a certain length of time, he would plunge into an orgy of detective stories and novels about people cast away on desert islands.

The plans for the Brazilian expedition came into being so unexpectedly that he could not choose his library with the usual care. He brought Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in the Everyman’s edition, and farmed out a volume to each of us, and most satisfactory it proved to all. He also brought Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus, but when he tried to read them during the descent of the Rio da Dúvida, they only served to fill him with indignation at their futility. Some translations of Greek plays, not those of Gilbert Murray, for which he had unstinted praise, met with but little better success, and we were nearly as badly off for reading matter as we were for provisions. I had brought along a selection of Portuguese classics and a number of French novels. The former were useless to father, but Henri Bordeaux and Maurice Leblanc were grist to the mill. It was father’s first introduction to Arsène, and he thoroughly enjoyed it--he liked the style, although for matter he preferred Conan Doyle. Father never cared very much about French novels--the French books that he read most were scientific volumes--histories of the Mongols--and an occasional hunting book, but he afterward became a great admirer of Henri Bordeaux.

At last the time came when there was nothing left but the Oxford books of English and French verse. The one of English verse he had always disliked. He said that if there were to be any American poetry included, it should be at any rate a good selection. The choice from Longfellow’s poems appealed to him as particularly poor, and I think that it was for this reason that he disapproved of the whole collection. Be that as it may, I realized how hard up for something to read father must be when he asked me for my Oxford book of English verse. For French verse father had never cared. He said it didn’t sing sufficiently. “The Song of Roland” was the one exception he granted. It was, therefore, a still greater proof of distress when he borrowed the Oxford book of French verse. He always loved to tell afterward that when he first borrowed it he started criticising and I had threatened to take it away if he continued to assail my favorites. In spite of all this he found it infinitely preferable to Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, and, indeed, became very fond of some of the selections. Villon and Ronsard particularly interested him.

When riding along through the wilderness father would often repeat poetry to himself. To learn a poem he had only to read it through a few times, and he seemed never to forget it. Sometimes we would repeat the poem together. It might be parts of the “Saga of King Olaf,” or Kipling’s “Rhyme of the Three Sealers,” or “Grave of a Hundred Head,” or, perhaps, “The Bell Buoy”--or again it might be something from Swinburne or Shelley or Keats--or the “Ballad of Judas Iscariot.” He was above all fond of the poetry of the open, and I think we children got much of our love for the outdoor life, not only from actual example, but from the poetry that father taught us.

There was an indissoluble bond between him and any of his old hunting companions, and in no matter what part of the world he met them, all else was temporarily forgotten in the eager exchange of reminiscences of old days. On the return from Africa, Seth Bullock, of Deadwood, met us in London. How delighted father was to see him, and how he enjoyed the captain’s comments on England and things English! One of the captain’s first remarks on reaching London was to the effect that he was so glad to see father that he felt like hanging his hat on the dome of Saint Paul’s and shooting it off. We were reminded of Artemus Ward’s classic reply to the guard who found him tapping, with his cane, an inscription in Westminster Abbey: “Come, come, sir, you mustn’t do that. It isn’t permitted, you know!” Whereupon Artemus Ward turned upon him: “What, mustn’t do it? If I like it, I’ll buy it!” It was never difficult to trail the captain. When my sister and I were going through Edinburgh Castle, the local guide showed us an ancient gun, firing a cluster of five or six barrels. With great amusement he told us how an American to whom he was showing the piece a few days previously had remarked that to be shot at with that gun must be like taking a shower-bath. A few questions served to justify the conclusion we had immediately formed as to the identity of our predecessor. Father had him invited to the dinner given by the donors of the Holland & Holland elephant rifle.

Of the hunting comrades of his early days, he told me that Mr. R. H. Munro Ferguson was the most satisfactory of all, for he met all requirements--always good-humored when things went wrong, possessing a keen sense of humor, understanding the value of silent companionship, and so well read and informed as to be able to discuss appreciatively any of the multitudinous questions of literature or world affairs that interested my father.

In Washington when an old companion turned up he would be triumphantly borne off to lunch, to find himself surrounded by famous scientists, authors, senators, and foreign diplomats. Father would shift with lightning rapidity from one to the other--first he might be discussing some question of Indian policy and administration, next the attitude of a foreign power--then an author’s latest novel--and a few moments later, he would have led on Johnny Goff to telling an experience with the cougar hounds.

Any man who had hunted with father was ready to follow him to the ends of the earth, and no passage of time could diminish his loyalty. With father the personal equation counted for so much. He was so whole-heartedly interested in his companions--in their aspirations and achievements. In every detail he was keenly interested, and he would select from his library those volumes which he thought would most interest each companion, and, perhaps, develop in him the love of the wonderful avocation which he himself found in reading. His efforts were not always crowned with success. Father felt that our African companion, R. J. Cuninghame, the “Bearded Master,” as the natives called him, being Scotch should be interested in Scott’s novels, so he selected from the “Pigskin Library” a copy of one of them--Waverley, I think it was. For some weeks Cuninghame made progress, not rapid, it is true, for he confessed to finding the notes the most interesting part of the book, then one day when they were sitting under a tree together in a rest during the noonday heat, and father in accordance with his invariable custom took out a book from his saddle-pocket, R. J. produced Waverley and started industriously to work on it. Father looked over his shoulder to see where he had got to, and to his amused delight found that Cuninghame had been losing ground--he was three chapters farther back than he had been two weeks before!

We more than once had occasion to realize how largely the setting is responsible for much that we enjoy in the wilds. Father had told me of how he used to describe the bellowing of the bull elk as he would hear it ring out in the frozen stillness of the forests of Wyoming. He thought of it, and talked of it, as a weird, romantic call--until one day when he was walking through the zoological gardens accompanied by the very person to whom he had so often given the description. As they passed the wapitis’ enclosure, a bull bellowed, and father’s illusions and credit were simultaneously shattered, for the romantic call he had so often dwelt upon was, in a zoological park, nothing more than a loud and discordant sort of bray.

In spite of this lesson we would see something among the natives that was interesting or unusual and get it to bring home, only to find that it was the exotic surroundings that had been responsible for a totally fictitious charm. A wild hill tribe in Africa use anklets made from the skin of the colobus, a graceful, long-haired monkey colored black and white. When father produced the anklets at home, the only thing really noticeable about them was the fact that they smelt!

Another equally unfortunate case was the affair of the beehives. The same hill tribe was very partial to honey. An individual’s wealth was computed in the number of beehives that he possessed. They were made out of hollowed logs three or four feet long and eight or ten inches in diameter. A wife or a cow was bought for an agreed upon number of beehives, and when we were hunting, no matter how hot the trail might be, the native tracker would, if we came to a clearing and saw some bees hovering about the forest flowers, halt and offer up a prayer that the bees should deposit the honey in one of his hives. It seemed natural to bring a hive home, but viewed in the uncompromising light of the North Shore of Long Island it was merely a characterless, uninteresting log.

Not the least of the many delights of being a hunting companion of father’s was his humor. No one could tell a better story, whether it was what he used to call one of his “old grouse in the gunroom” stories, or an account, with sidelights, of a contemporaneous adventure. The former had to do with incidents in his early career in the cow-camps of the Dakotas, or later on with the regiment in Cuba--and phrases and incidents of them soon became coin-current in the expedition. Father’s humor was never under any circumstances ill-natured, or of such a sort as might make its object feel uncomfortable. If anything amusing occurred to a member of the expedition, father would embroider the happening in inimitable fashion, but always in such a way that the victim himself was the person most amused. The accompanying drawing will serve as illustration. Father and I had gone out to get some buck to eke out the food-supply for the porters. We separated, but some time later I caught sight of father and thought I would join him and return to camp. I didn’t pay particular attention to what he was doing, and as he was some way off I failed to notice that he was walking stooped to keep concealed by a rise of ground from some buck he was stalking. The result was the picture.

Before we started on the serious exploring part of the Brazilian trip, we paid visits to several fazendas or ranches in the state of Matto Grosso, with the purpose of hunting jaguar, as well as the lesser game of the country. One of the fazendas at which we stayed belonged to the governor of the state. When we were wakened before daylight to start off on the hunt we were given, in Brazilian fashion, the small cup of black coffee and piece of bread which constitutes the native Brazilian breakfast. We would then sally forth to return to the ranch not before noon, and sometimes much later, as the hunting luck dictated. We would find an enormous lunch waiting for us at the house. Father, who was accustomed to an American breakfast, remarked regretfully that he wished the lunch were divided, or that at least part of it were used to supplement the black coffee of daybreak. The second morning, as I went down the hall, the dining-room door was ajar, and I caught sight of the table laden with the cold meats and salads that were to serve as part of our elaborate luncheon many dim hours hence. I hurried back to tell father, and we tiptoed cautiously into the dining-room, closing the door noiselessly behind us. While we were engaged in making rapid despatch of a cold chicken, we heard our hosts calling, and the next minute the head of the house popped in the door! As father said afterward, we felt and looked like two small boys caught stealing jam in the pantry.

The Brazilian exploration was not so carefully planned as the African trip, because father had not intended to make much of an expedition. The first time he mentioned the idea was in April, 1913, in reply to a letter I wrote from São Paulo describing a short hunting expedition that I had made. “The forest must be lovely; some time I must get down to see you, and we’ll take a fortnight’s outing, and you shall hunt and I’ll act as what in the North Woods we used to call ‘Wangan man,’ and keep camp!”

Four months later he wrote that he was planning to come down and see me; that he had been asked to make addresses in Brazil, Argentina, and Chile, and “I shall take a naturalist with me, if, as I hope, I return via Paraguay and the Amazon.” At the time it did not look as if it would be possible for me to go on the trip. In father’s next letter he said that after he left me, “instead of returning in the ordinary tourist Bryan-Bryce-way, I am going to see if it is possible to work across from the Plata into the valley of the Amazon, and come out through the Brazilian forest. This may not be possible. It won’t be anything like our African trip. There will be no hunting and no adventures, so that I shall not have the pang I otherwise would about not taking you along.” These plans were amplified and extended a certain amount, but in the last letter I received they didn’t include a very serious expedition.