A LOST LEADER.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9919, 6 August 1910, Page 1

A LOST LEADER.

Mr Boyd Alexander.

(" Spectator.")

The death of Mr Boyd Alexander at Tama', not a great distance from Lake Chad, which had been, mapped by him accurately for the first time, removes at an early age an explorer who had inherited the spirit of the great pioneers, and who might have added one knows not what glories to the roll of their achievements. The successful explorer must be extraordinarily well, equipped nowadays. He must be a hunter, because he must often kill food for himself arid others; he must have great endurance and illimitable patience; to do. mapping of any value he must be an accurate draughtsman, and must bo able to use his scientific instruments without any j;ouch of the amateur.. Then he would hardly shine among explorers if he had not a working knowledge of geology, not to mention the various branches of natural history; and, above all, he must have the quickness of judgment, the resolution and the courage necessary to deal •with a crisis.

Mr Boyd . Alexander, who was a Lieutenant in the Rifle Brigade, had an exceptionally large share of the explorer's qualities. His way .with the natives was marvellous—like that of another famous Scots explorer, Joseph Thomson; He was a member of an old Ayrshire family, and having enough money to please himself, he might have satisfied his passion for perilous travel without ever troubling to carry out scientific work of the first importance. He equipped himself mentally as carefully as he equipped himself with arms and food.

It was a fascinating as well as a very tragic story which he told in his book, " From the Niger to the Nile." No journey had been so fruitful in scientific results since H. M. Stanley' 6 expedition, and none had required so much endurance since Mr Grogan's march from the Cape to Cairo. Mr Alexander was accompanied on this eventful expedition by his brother, Captain Claud Alexander, of the Scots Guards, and Mr Talbot, both of ( whom were distinguished surveyors and geographers, and .Captain Gosling, who was a first-rate hunter and naturalist. The party started from Lokoja, in Ntn-tlvern Nigeria, and' proceeded up the River Benue, with Lake Chad as ■the: objective. The Europeans suffered, severely from, fever, and at Maifoni Captain Claud Alexander died of . some form of gastro-en teritis. Soon a fter'"iVardi' -Mi' -QilbOfc'' leturned homo with' his maps of those parts of Nigeria which had never bbfore been suit eyed, and Mr Boyd Alexander and Captain Gosling continued the journey alone. . The exploration of Lake Chad took •many mouths. When the party arrived a battle was going on on the shore between two rival tribes. At. tho sound of a gun the combatants scattered. One side "dashed straight into the water and waded and waded till they faded away in the distance, still wading." Mapping was very difficult because the curious people, the Buduina, who live on tho islands of this shallow lake, utterly refused to act as guides, disappearing into the reeds. whonever a white man came in sight. Later, in the Congo Forest, Mr Boyd Alexander came across traces of the okapi, and after a long hunt a specimen was shot by Jose Lopes, Mr Alexander's faithful and wonderfully' resourceful Portuguese servant. The okapi is the rarest and most curious of existing animals, being, except the giraffe, the only survivor of the Miocene group of girafidae. At the Belgian port of Niangara Captain Gosling died of fever. In painful but undismayed loneliness Mr ■Alexander pushed on till he reached the Nile, having brought his boats by water across the entire continent—a

truly wonderful feat. On Mb return he was awarded the gold medal of the Royal Society. • It is difficult to think without being truly moved that of the three accomplished young soldiers who took part in the) expedition of 1904 to 1807 not one remains. Of the three, the most accomplished, and perhaps not the least attractive, was he who has just been murdered in the country with which his-name will be for ever honourably associated.