ked when in open ground. They move along with great rapidity and on
all fours, that is, with the knuckles of their hands touching the
ground. Artists, in representing the gorilla walking, generally make the
arms too much bowed outwards, and the elbows too much bent; this gives
the figures an appearance of heaviness and awkwardness. When the
gorillas that I watched left their plantain trees, they moved off at a
great pace over the ground, with their arms extended straight forward
towards the ground, and moving rapidly. I may mention also that having
now opened the stomachs of several freshly killed gorillas, I have never
found anything but vegetable matter in them.

When I returned to Nkongon Mboumba I found there my old friend Akondogo,
chief of one of the Commi villages, who had just returned from the Ngobi
country, a little further south. To my great surprise and pleasure, he
had brought for me a living gorilla, a young one, but the largest I had
ever seen captured alive. Like Joe, the young male whose habits in
confinement I described in 'Equatorial Africa,' this one showed the most
violent and ungovernable disposition. He tried to bite every one who
came near him, and was obliged to be secured by a forked stick closely
applied to the back of his neck. This mode of imprisoning these animals
is a very improper one if the object be to keep them alive and to tame
them, but, unfortunately, in this barbarous country, we had not the
materials requisite to build a strong cage. The injury caused to this
one by the forked stick eventually caused his death. As I had some more
hunting to do, I left the animal in charge of Akondogo until he should
have an opportunity of sending it to me on the Fernand Vaz.

The natives of all the neighboring country were now so well aware that I
wanted live gorillas, and was willing to give a high price for them,
that many were stimulated to search with great perseverance; the good
effects of this were soon made evident.

One day as I was quietly dining with Captain Holder, of the _Cambria_ (a
vessel just arrived from England), one of my men came in with the
startling news that three live gorillas had been brought, one of them
full grown. I had not long to wait; in they came. First, a very large
adult female, bound hand and foot; then her female child, screaming
terribly; and lastly, a vigorous young male, also tightly bound. The
female had been ingeniously secured by the negroes to a strong st