ECHO OF BOER WAR

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 127, 3 June 1929, Page 10

ECHO OF BOER WAR

FORMER SCOUT'S TOUR

TO STUDY GAME RESERVES

Major F. R. Burnham, Chief of Scouts to Lord Roberts in the South African War, was one of the through passengers from San .Francisco to Sydney by the R.M.S. Makura, which arrived in Wellington to-day. Major Burnham, interviewed by a "Post" reporter this afternoon, stated that he was born in America, but could trace his English stock for six or seven generations back. "I am going on in tlie Makura to Sydney,", he added, "and from there by the White Star liner Themistoeles to South Africa. My intention is to traverse once more the ground I covered in my exploring work there and in the wars I served in. The particular object of my visit is to investigate, the great game reserves of Africa. I am a member' of the State Park Commission of California, which is just forming some great parks and game reserves in California; and the commission wants me to see what information I can get from the very experienced men in charge of the game reserves of Africa. FILMS TO BE TAKEN. "My wife and son, and his wife and my granddaughter, are travelling with me; and my son is taking with him the latest apparatus for taking moving-

pictures in colour of animal life on the veldt. This is the first outfit of the kind to go to Africa. The pictures he takes will be for the State Park Commission to use in an educational way for our own people. I wanted to use these cameras, if possible, in New Zealand this trip; but we will have to make another expedition to the Dominio A for the purpose. Our work in Africa will occupy from four to five months of our time; but we hope to return to New Zealand. In fact, my son is planning to come back about 4he end of next year. We were out this morning and took a beautiful panorama of Wellington Harbour. We are engaged on a purely scientific expedition, not on behalf of any mov-ing-picture concern. Our secondary object in going to Africa i. to visit my old friends in Africa who were in the wars with me. "I met the Hew Zealanders and Australians in the Boer War, and many of them were great friends of mine. I have always had a great desire to come to New Zealand and Australia and see the countries that furnish such men. j We have had a very pleasant voyage out with a number of Australians who were delegates to the Vancouver Educational Conference. "The first Australians 1 met were men of the fighting type in South Africa. I enjoyed meeting them very much, and made friendships which have endured all these years. I shall meet in Sydney a New Zealander (Mr. Walker Dun, a big six-footer), who served with me in an expedition of a thousand officers' and men all told to the head of the Nile away back in 1904. "We shall meet at Nairobi, in South Africa, some more of our family who are coming out the other way."