African Adventurers

Author of Death in the Silent Places and other books about big-game hunting, Capstick here profiles four British expatriates, all legendary figures in colonial Africa. Frederick Selous, a friend of Cecil Rhodes, hunted elephants in the 1870s. Constantine ``Iodine'' Ionides was a soldier, game ranger and professional safari leader in the 1920s and '30s who collected poisonous snakes for museums. Early in this century, ivory trader Johnny Boyes managed to subdue warring Kikuyu tribesmen, only to be arrested by the colonial government. At about the same time, Jim Sutherland was probably the most successful ivory hunter of all time; he also used his tracking skills to kill man-eating lions. All of these men brushed with death repeatedly, and Capstick gives the full details. He has a fund of macho stories that would fill Hemingway with envy. Big-game hunters and Old Africa hands will appreciate this re-creation of a vanished Africa. (July)