“ From 1855 to 1859 he regularly explored the regions of West Africa in the neighbourhood of the equator, gaining considerable knowledge of the delta of the Ogowé river and the estuary of the Gabun. During his travels he saw numbers of the great anthropoid apes called the gorilla (possibly the great ape described by Carthaginian navigators) , then known to scientists only by a few skeletons. ”

“ A subsequent expedition, from 1863 to 1865, enabled him to confirm the accounts given by the ancients of a pygmy people inhabiting the African forests. Narratives of both expeditions were published, in 1861 and 1867 respectively, under the titles Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa, with Accounts of the Manners and Customs of the People, and of the Chace of the Gorilla, Crocodile, and other Animals ”