Frederick C. Selous’s work, written at the urging of President Theodore Roosevelt, contains many of his most keen observations about life and wildlife in Africa. Fascinating not only as a period piece, Selous's thoughts are remarkably prescient about the state of game in Africa even today. Though it was written before the rise of the commercial poaching that has ravaged so much of the continent, the book gives an excellent insight into the need to carefully observe, record, and interpret the ecological signs found in the wild. Easy and lively in style, the tales told within encompass everything from dietary habits of hyena to the effects of sleeping sickness on agriculture.