Although he says little of it at the time, Selous did an immense amount of tramping to and fro, all footwork because of the "fly," in the unhealthy country, both contiguous to and in the Portuguese territory about the Pungwi and Busi rivers in 1891 and 1892, in the hope of finding a road to the East Coast that would be free from the tsetse fly and where waggons could pass. In this he was unsuccessful, and he was reluctantly forced to admit that a railway would be the only method of transport to the coast, and that until this was made no progress was possible. However, his journeys carried him for the first time into the last great haunt of game south of the Zambesi, for at this time the whole of the territory in the neighbourhood of these rivers was one huge game reserve which, owing to its unhealthiness, was seldom visited by sportsmen or even meat-hunters. And so it continued till 1896, when the rinderpest swept off nine-tenths of the koodoos, elands and buffalo. Since that day the game recovered in a measure, and even to-day there is more game there than anywhere south of the Zambesi, but it contains a shadow of its former abundance at the time when Selous first visited it. Practically Selous was the first white man to see this great assembly of game and to hunt them, for the Portuguese were not hunters and never left the footpaths. He found vast herds of buffaloes in the reed-beds, bushbucks as tame as in the Garden of Eden stood gazing at a few yards and did not fly at the approach of man, whilst out on the plains there was a constant procession of Liechtenstein's hartebeest, blue wildebeests, tsessebes, water-bucks, zebras, and here and there were always scattered parties of reedbucks, oribis, and the smaller antelopes. Wart-hogs and bush-pigs were equally tame and confiding, and hippopotami disported in the rivers and lagoons in broad daylight, and there was not a night that several troops of lions were not heard roaring. Yet curiously enough, in spite of the abundance of the last-named, Selous only saw three individuals, one of which he killed after it had charged twice. This, he says, was the last of "thirty-one lions I have shot."[42] This number does not tally with the statement, "I have only shot twenty-five lions when entirely by myself,"[43] but the discrepancy is accounted for by the fact that he killed six lions between 1893 and 1896.
The opening up of the new country proceeded rapidly till June, 1892, when Selous wrote to his mother from Salisbury:—
"The telegraph wire is now at Fort Charter, and before the end of next month the office will be opened here in Salisbury, and Mashunaland will be in telegraph communication with the whole of the civilized world. This, if you come to think of it, is really a magnificent piece of enterprise. We are having the most lovely weather up here, although it is the middle of summer and the rainy season; nice cool cloudy days, with showers of rain occasionally, but nothing worth speaking of. The Government buildings are progressing rapidly. We now have an abundance of vegetables here. Everything thrives marvellously, potatoes, cabbage, onions, shalots, radishes, lettuces, etc. etc. Wheat sowed in August last by the head of the Africander Bond deputation, ripened and was cut in four months and a few days from the date of sowing, and has been sent down to Cape Town. Major Johnson's agricultural expert pronounced it to be as fine a sample of wheat as he had ever seen, and says he will be able to raise two crops a year. In fact, the country is now proved to be an exceptionally fine one for both agriculture and stock-farming, in spite of Mr. Labouchere and Lord Randolph Churchill. The gold prospects are also improving, and many of Mr. Perkins' prognostications have already been falsified. I think there is no doubt that this country will have a grand future, but the development will be very slow for some time yet; in fact, until a railway has been made from the East coast, at least as far as Manica. Once this railway has been built, however, the country must be developed very quickly, I think. All impartial persons agree that the climate on this plateau is cooler and altogether more enjoyable than that of Kimberley and many other parts of civilized South Africa; but, of course, directly one leaves the plateau and gets into the low bush-country towards the Zambesi, the East coast, or the Transvaal, fever is rife during the rainy season. Unfortunately, most of the gold-belts are in this unhealthy zone, and until the bush is cut down, the land cultivated, and good houses are built round the mines, miners will suffer from fever in the bad season; but this is the same in all new countries. I am now going down to make a road from Manica to the other side of Massi-Kessi, so as to be ready from our side to meet the tramway or railway which the Mozambique Company have undertaken to make from the Pungwi river. My intention is to leave the Company's service in June next, and in August I shall go down to the East coast, and hope to be in Johannesburg in October, and in England before the end of the year. I do not intend to re-visit Mashunaland for several years, but I shall have considerable interests there, which will increase in value as the country develops. I intend to visit America, to see the World's Fair, in 1893, and should like to visit Japan at the same time. I consider myself independent, as I can live on the £330 a year which my de Beers shares produce, and I have a good many more properties which may turn out valuable."
Selous continued making roads until May, 1892, when there being no further work for him to do, he terminated his engagement with the British South Africa Company, and went down to Beira, and so to Cape Town and England, which he reached on December 17th, 1892. Before leaving, however, he did a little hunting, and killed his last lion on October 3rd, and his last elephant, a splendid old bull, with tusks weighing 108 lbs. the pair, on October 7th.
It was in December, 1891, that Selous killed his finest lion, a splendid animal with a good mane, and one whose pegged-out skin measured over eleven feet. This lion had done much damage at Hartley Hills, breaking into stables and kraals, and destroyed many horses and goats. This was an unusually daring beast, and efforts to destroy him had been of no avail. Whilst dining with Dr. Edgelow one night, Selous heard his driver, John, fire from his camp close by, and called out to ask the cause. The driver replied that a lion had just killed one of the loose oxen. Nothing could be done that night, but at dawn Selous took the spoor in the wet ground, but lost it on the dry veldt. Next evening he made a shelter against a tree.
"As the shooting-hole between the overhanging branches of the tree behind which I sat only allowed me to get a view directly over the carcase of the ox, I arranged another opening to the right, which gave me a good view up the waggon-road along which I thought the lion would most likely come, and I placed the muzzle of my rifle in this opening when I entered my shelter. As the night was so light, I thought it very likely that my vigil might be a long one; for even if he did not wait until the moon had set, I never imagined that the lion would put in an appearance until after midnight, when the camp would be quite quiet. Under this impression, I had just finished the arrangement of my blankets, placing some behind me and the rest beneath me, so as to make myself as comfortable as possible in so confined a space, and was just leaning back, and dreamily wondering whether I could keep awake all night, when, still as in a dream, I saw the form of a magnificent lion pass rapidly and noiselessly as a phantom of the night across the moonlight disc of the shooting-hole I had made to the right of the tree-stem. In another instant he had passed and was hidden by the tree, but a moment later his shaggy head again appeared before the opening formed by the diverging stems. Momentary as had been the glimpse I had of him as he passed the right-hand opening, I had marked him as a magnificent black-maned lion with neck and shoulders well covered with long shaggy hair. He now stood with his forelegs right against the breast of the dead ox, and, with his head held high, gazed fixedly towards my waggon and oxen, every one of which he could, of course, see very distinctly, as well as my boy John and the Kafirs beside him. I heard my horse snort, and knew he had seen the lion, but the oxen, although they must have seen him too, showed no sign of fear. The Kafirs were still laughing and talking noisily not fifty yards away, and, bold as he was, the lion must have felt a little anxious as he stood silently gazing in the direction from which he thought danger might be apprehended.
"All this time, but without ever taking my eyes off the lion, I was noiselessly moving the muzzle of my little rifle from the right-hand-side opening to the space that commanded a view of his head. This I was obliged to do very cautiously, for fear of touching a branch behind me and making a noise. I could see the black crest of mane between his ears move lightly in the wind, for he was so near that had I held my rifle by the small of the stock I could have touched him with the muzzle by holding it at arm's length. Once only he turned his head and looked round right into my eyes, but, of course, without seeing me, as I was in the dark, and, apparently, without taking the slightest alarm, as he again turned his head and stood looking at the waggon as before. I could only see his head, his shoulder being hidden by the right-hand stem of the tree, and I had made up my mind to try and blow his brains out, thinking I was so near that I could not fail to do so, even without being able to see the sight of my rifle. I had just got the muzzle of my rifle into the fork of the tree, and was about to raise it quite leisurely, the lion having hitherto showed no signs of uneasiness. I was working as cautiously as possible, when without the slightest warning he suddenly gave a low grating growl, and turned round, his head disappearing instantly from view. With a jerk I pulled the muzzle of my rifle from the one opening and pushed it through the other just as the lion walked rapidly past in the direction from which he had come. He was not more than four or five yards from me, and I should certainly have given him a mortal wound had not my rifle missed fire at this most critical juncture, the hammer giving a loud click in the stillness of the night. At the sound the lion broke into a gallop, and was almost instantly out of sight."
This was a terrible misfortune, but next morning Selous tracked the lion up a watercourse and soon found him.
"John was looking about near the edge of this shallow water, and I had turned my horse's head to look along the bank higher up, when the unmistakable growl of a lion issued from the bushes beyond the rivulet, and at the same time John said, 'Daar hij' (there he is). I was off my horse in an instant to be ready for a shot, when he turned round and trotted away, and John ran to try and catch him. I thought the luck was all against me, as I expected the lion would make off and get clean away; but I ran forward, trying to get a sight of him when he suddenly made his appearance in the bush about fifty yards away, and catching sight of me, came straight towards me at a rapid pace, holding his head low and growling savagely. I suppose he wanted to frighten me, but he could not have done a kinder thing. He came right on to the further bank of the little stream just where it formed a pool of water, and stood there amongst some rocks growling and whisking his tail about, and always keeping his eyes fixed upon me. Of course, he gave me a splendid shot, and in another instant I hit him, between the neck and the shoulder, in the side of his chest, with a 360-grain expanding bullet. As I pulled the trigger I felt pretty sure he was mine. With a loud roar he reared right up, and turning over sideways fell off the rock on which he had been standing into the pool of water below him. The water was over three feet deep, and for an instant he disappeared entirely from view, but the next instant regaining his feet stood on the bottom with his head and shoulders above the surface. I now came towards him, when again seeing me, he came plunging through the water towards me, growling angrily. But his strength was fast failing him, and I saw it was all he could do to reach the bank, so I did not fire, as I was anxious not to make holes in his skin. He just managed to get up the bank, when I finished him with a shot through the lungs, to which he instantly succumbed."[44]
Selous has always been regarded by the British public as the first lion-hunter of all time. They would like to have seen him travelling round with a large circus and a band giving demonstrations of shooting lions from horseback à la Buffalo Bill, but nothing was further from his own ideas than such a showman's display. Being as truthful as he was modest, he always entirely disclaimed any great prowess as a lion-hunter and said what was true—that many men had killed a far greater number of lions than himself. It was only on particular occasions like the last adventure described that he went out of his way to shoot lions that had become troublesome and dangerous, but at all times he never declined a fight when he was lucky enough to meet lions, whether he was himself afoot or accompanied by dogs. If he had wished to make a great bag of lions, doubtless he could have done so; but he never wished to pose as a lion-hunter like Jules Gerard and others, and so his total bag was modest. Actually, he himself shot thirty-one lions and assisted in the destruction of eleven others. Even his good friend, H. A. Bryden, usually so accurate in his statements, says: "He was easily the greatest lion-hunter of his time," and the general public, taking the cue from many writers, say a thing is so-and-so and the statement becomes standardized. But, after all, it is only a very few men who know the real facts of any case, and they often have a habit of holding their tongues. Doubtless, if Selous had enjoyed the opportunities of the Brothers Hill, he would have been just as active and successful in destroying lions as they—if he had not been killed in the process. Selous, as a matter of fact, had no more genius for hunting than that enjoyed by many others. He was an admirable hunter, but just as unable to spoor a lion on dry veldt as other white men—that gift alone belonging to certain black races. The title, therefore, of being "the greatest lion-hunter"—even if we admit the desirability of using superlatives—seems to belong to the man or men who by perfectly fair means and taking risks—the same as Selous himself did—have shot the greatest number of lions. Wherefore, I give a few particulars.