← The Origins Foundation Podcast
The Origins Foundation Podcast
Episode 633 - Paul Hubbard || Frederick Courtney Selous Part 2
01:40:16
Most of everyone has heard of Theodore Roosevelt, some of you may have heard of Frederick Courtney Selous. But did you know that they were really good friends? Did you know how they became friends? Do you know how they both shaped conservation? In this second of a two part podcast Paul Hubbard, our favorite historian and archaeologist and “doer of great things”, rejoins Robbie to continue talking about the famous hunter Frederick Courtney Selous. Be sure to go listen to part 1 from earlier this week!
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- [00:00]
Paul Hubbard
Planning a fishing trip shouldn't feel like a full time job.
- [00:03]
Robbie
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- [00:30]
Paul Hubbard
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- [01:00]
Robbie
Okay, so this is part two of Frederick Courtney Salou with Paul Hubbard. If you have not listened to part one, you need to stop this podcast and just go back one podcast. We're going to drop these podcasts in series. So part one and part two. This is part two from 1882 through to when Frederick Courtney Slew dies. And you need to listen to this entire podcast. I guarantee it's worth your time. Paul gets super emotional at the end talking about Salou and his death, and he literally ends this podcast with Teddy Roosevelt's last paragraph in Salus obituary. It is a fantastic podcast, fantastic podcast series. You need to listen to it, learn from it, share it around. I got a better appreciation, a deeper appreciation of who Salou was and now I'm inspired to learn more. I hope you'll do the same.
- [01:59]
Paul Hubbard
Enjoy.
- [02:03]
Robbie
So five years ago, there was a reason why I started this movement. And the truth then is the truth now that we need to champion our narrative. We need to champion the truth around what we do and who we are. There's a sweet spot with a gun, you know, too heavy and it's a
- [02:18]
Paul Hubbard
burden to walk with. Too light and you whipping it.
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Robbie
Why is the project so important to the hunting community?
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Paul Hubbard
It's. It's a. I think it's not only important, I think it's. I think it's vital. I think it's. It's just in time. It's like snakes and ladders. You guys are climbing the ladder and then somebody does something Stupid. And you just slide down.
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Robbie
That is such an amazing analogy. Snakes and ladders.
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Paul Hubbard
Yeah. You know, ivory in, in my opinion, was the plastic of its age. Okay, okay. The expenses are going up. It goes a long way with families. We have families that do need it.
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Robbie
Let me close this door because I have a little wiener dog. What you. Are you laughing because I said wiener?
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Paul Hubbard
I'm really glad you finished the sentence out.
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Robbie
I'm sorry. The first happen.
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Paul Hubbard
What are we doing here today?
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Robbie
You're telling the whole world. So back in the saddle for part two. Paul Hubbard.
- [03:21]
Paul Hubbard
Looking forward to it, man.
- [03:23]
Robbie
Everybody who's listening to this right now. If you have not listened to part one of Frederick Courtney Salou, go back. Stop right now. Go back. It should be the podcast that occurred just before this one in the line. Go listen to that one. And then come here and listen to the part two of Courtney Slu. Part one was 1871 through 1881, essentially a little bit before 71, a little bit of his youth and his boisterous times in England at the rugby school. And now we have gone through the 10 years of him being a professional hunter, a contract hunter, contract elephant hunter, really. And now he, like most of us, is entering into a new career.
- [04:14]
Paul Hubbard
Yeah, well, that's it. You know, he's. He's still going to be. He's still a hunter until the day he dies. You know, I don't. I think it's. It's a state of being as much as it is a career or anything, but, you know, he becomes now a hunter for. I think as we're talking a bit about, you know, as a hunter for conservation and as axiomatic.
- [04:34]
Robbie
As ethics changed, his thought processes changed. Right. He stopped being what he was because he's like, man, there's not many big elephants around anymore.
- [04:41]
Paul Hubbard
That's right. Yeah. As the elephants dry up, you know. Which was a subject of many letters he wrote to his mom, complaining it's always quite fun to see how close he was to his mom and several of his siblings, but especially how he could tell her what he was really thinking, which never comes across in many of his books, which, again, is. Is normal. You know, you don't have to share every detail of your personal life in your publications, but I really do enjoy reading how frank he was. And it's not to say he wasn't honest in his other books, but it's just those little details that help you understand his mindsets. And, you know, he wasn't just worried about the fact that he didn't have a career anymore as an elephant hunter. What always strikes me in a lot of his writings and what he puts into his later books, especially his first one, Hunter's Wanderings in Africa, is his bigger concern was the fact, well, there are, there's increasing open spaces in Africa where we're losing some of the megafauna, to use the modern phrase. You know, I'm not seeing my elephants like I used to. I'm not seeing lions like I used to. And it's because of us and, you know, us humans going in. And what's fascinating to me is he puts, I won't say the blame, but the responsibility clearly at the feet of the incoming Europeans who have also worked with the indigenous African societies all around there and said, well, it's all of us because we've all been making money and we need to change how we're doing things. And it's not like it happens overnight either. You know, Salou still has to make his living. And as we chat a little bit about, he still remains a hunter, but now he's hunting for. For specimens for museums and for other educational institutions. And he's also earning a living by bringing people to hunt down here, which he was often neatly able to combine with his collecting trips. So, you know, he's able to get guys to shoot some trophies for themselves and then also get them to say, well, help pay for us to get that bird or that mammal for this institution or that institution. And, you know, of all of the Paul institutions that he was.
- [06:53]
Robbie
These people that are hearing. These people that are hearing about him, they're hearing about him because of the book, right? The book that got published. You said a thousand copies only went out, but did those thousand copies, like, reach the North American shore?
- [07:09]
Paul Hubbard
Well, so, you know, here's the. This is his first one. This is a Hunter's Wanderings in Africa with the iconic cover with the three antelope there. And this is still the reprint. I, I still, I, I still haven't found my original, but not. No, sorry, this isn't the one I have an original of. It's the other one. So they do a thousand copies of the first edition, and then it goes through a further three editions. And then what's kind of amazing is, since 1898, it has never been out of print.
- [08:34]
Robbie
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- [10:48]
Paul Hubbard
Good luck that you can buy brand new by so many different publishers around the world. A lot of them add their own little tweaks to it. You know, new introduction or extra photos or a biography of Salu or something like that in them. But you know, this, this book really becomes like his business card, you know. And my, my favorite of all the reprints because I own about 20 of the different reprints because of those additions of new material to try and make it, you know, I want someone to do one big one, you know, with everything in it. But you know, this is my favorite one which was done here in Zimbabwe in the, in the 70s, which is a company, it used to be Books of Rhodesia, now defunct, unfortunately, although they still run a secondhand bookshop. But the, you know, the publishing arm of it dies in the early 80s for a variety of reasons. But they reprint several of Salou's books and several others of his generation. And one of the things is. Is we with this book, it just makes this huge impact in the Victorian society, British society, at that time, hence the multiple reprints in such a short space of time, you know, Salou hoped to earn maybe, you know, like three or four hundred pounds from it to fund another expedition down to Africa. And when all is said and done, in his lifetime, I think he had earned nearly 20 times that amount just from, you know, that. Those. Those reprints of this book. And again, you know, the. It was a huge risk for the. The original publisher, which was Richard Bentley and Son. In fact, Salou wanted so many pictures in the book, you know, like he. To show you his naturalist bent. Like, you take a page like that where he's got, you know, very detailed anatomic drawings of the various buck that he's talking about in the manuscript. And because he wanted that detail, he actually had to pay for the extra plates to be done, which cost him 68 pounds a figure which was a huge amount of money. You know, the 68 pounds could get you a wagon in southern Africa in those days. So, you know, he's stumping up a lot of cash to get what he wants. But he knows the value of his information. He also knows the value of communicating that. And, you know, he's quite modest in the way he describes his writing. It's. It's a lot better than what he calls it, which is workmanlike. I think he's a born storyteller, whether in person or in print. And that comes through, which is why I think his books have endured in print for well over a century since his death, and find a new audience every generation, and they deserve to. It's not just the stories of hunting, which I love to read from him and many others, but also all the other nuggets and tidbits that we were talking about that he captures. And so what happens is a lot of people read that book. It goes absolutely massive in the public consciousness, you know, so viral nowadays. And one of the things that happens is a lot of the people who read it, you know, Africa is new on the radar for a lot of the folks at that time. You know, there's increasing interest in Africa with the discovery of diamonds in Kimberley, and then there's discovery of gold in Northern South Africa, not the wits gold fields yet, you know, when this book comes out, that's 1881. The wit's gold fields are 1885. But you know, there's increasing riches being noticed in Africa and the wildlife is now seen as one of those not just minerals, but the wildlife. And so there's a lot of interest from people to get there and to either own a piece of it at home without ever stepping foot to the continent to have that allure of the exotic, or to go to the continent for themselves and explore, to hunt and to just be here. And so Salus book, whether he intended it or not, I don't think he ever did. Like I said, he just wrote the book to make a bit of money. That's what. Because he comes home having sold up everything in his elephant hunting stuff. He sells his wagons, he sells his horses, he sells his, not his guns, but he sells, you know, and he just buys up whatever he can to bring from South Africa back to, to, to England with him. He's still not married yet by the way. So you know, when he comes back here, he's, he's looking for something new. And so yeah, with this book it suddenly just becomes this huge calling card for him that everyone. And he now realizes, hang on, you know, I'm getting asked all these questions, I'm getting requests for specimens and trophies and all this cheese. Like I can get back into my, my beloved.
- [15:25]
Robbie
Every whilst he is in the United Kingdom, he's not back in middle of, you know, Matabele land, essentially getting his correspondences brought to him. He's in a place where correspondence can get to him and people are like, oh, hey, yes, yeah, you know, he's,
- [15:43]
Paul Hubbard
he's, he's in London, he's gone back to check on the family at Regent's park. You know, he's also doing a bit of a speaking tour, which was very common with books. You know, the publishers would always insist that you go around England and Ireland and Wales and you know, all that sort of stuff in Scotland. You know, he goes onto the, the continent as well to do a bit of a speaking tour here and there. So you know, he, it's also after he talks, hey, you know, can, geez, like how do I get there? Can you help me? And all this. So you know, he, he spends a couple of years in, in Europe at this time. He actually does a bit of hunting. He goes to Turkey for egg collecting because he decides he wants a nutcracker egg in his own collection. So he, he Fight, you know, that's what he does. And again, I identify so strongly with that because, you know, we all travel to exotic places to take that one trophy. For me, it's always a book or a rock art or archaeological site that I will travel into the wilds of nowhere to get that one thing, you know. So I really strongly identify with that sort of passion and fascination. And then, of course, the lure of Africa is far too strong. So Sulu comes back here from. I can't remember the exact date anyway, in 1882 he comes back here, but now he's on expeditions to collect for museums. And he's also, for the next six or seven years, he's bouncing in and out of civilization, let's call it, coming back to collect people, to take them out on expeditions with him, to also come back to port to ship all of the trophies and specimens that he had collected and get a bit more money, sell off other bits and pieces and then back into the interior. And he spends a lot of his time on the Zimbabwean plateau, also traveling up into modern day Angola, Zambia, but not as frequently as he is all around the Zimbabwean Plateau. He also goes into southern Angola. He goes into Botswana quite fairly often. And so he's just bouncing around in between this and still keeping in touch with his friends from the old days as well. It's not like he's a holier than thou convert. You know, he's still hanging out with his mates. Interestingly, he's a teetotaler now at this stage of his life as well. You know, he, he recommended the best tonic before starting a hunt was two cups of cold, weak tea. So, you know, there's, there's some advice for, for, for when you're coming to Africa. I could, I could tell you now I, I personally drink tea all the time on safari. You know, you don't often find me with any sugary drinks or alcohol. It's tea. Empire juice, as we jokingly call it, you know. So 80, 82.
- [18:31]
Robbie
Through what time frame is he doing these expeditions and specimen collecting? Through 95, maybe.
- [18:38]
Paul Hubbard
Well, actually until 1889. That year is a pivotal change in his life because he enters the service of Cecil John Rhodes and, and why he does this, okay, is Sulu at his core, you know, all the things I admire about him, the one thing that sticks a little bit today, even though I'm a direct result of some of this, all of this processes actually, is that he was an ardent British imperialist. He actually writes in one of his books that no person cannot help but be bettered than by contact with an Englishman, which is really, really arrogant and quite cocky with. But also it was a sincere belief. So I'm not going to stand on my soapbox about this, but, you know, with the consequences of those sorts of attitudes, you know, it does stick a little bit. But what happens is Sulu did not trust the Portuguese. His encounters with them in Mozambique and in Angola at the time, especially petty officialdom. Also their huge involvement with the slave trade was anathema to him at the time. And he also felt that, you know, like the man who was to be his employer. And then later on, you know, I suppose you could call him them comrades in arms. Cecil Rhodes, he felt that it would be better for Africa if the British colonized it, you know, because of their innate superiority at the time. That Victorian mentality is something else to behold, you know, so Selu having, with all of that massive experience that he had on the Zimbabwean plateau, he is the right man in the right place at the right time for the colonization of this country. And one of the things that had happened in an effort to keep the Portuguese out of Northern Zimbabwe, one of his first little dips into the colonial process, completely independently, was while on a hunting trip in 1889 in the Missouri Valley. He actually bumps into one of the great heroes of Zimbabwean history, a chief called Mapondera. And Mapondera is another long, complicated character. But suffice to say, he was actually one of the few Shona chiefs who had resisted any attempts by the Ndebele to conquer him and add his people and their lands to the Ndebele kingdom. And so he was living a fully independent lifestyle in the. In the Missouri Valley and through. What the hell is that place called? Teraringa. So it's basically, if you think of a map of Zimbabwe, everything sort of north west of Harari, you know, this big area there all the way through to Lama Gandhi on your way to. To Kariba, you know, that that whole area was independent. It's where the Chinoi Caves are as well, which Salu visits. He's the first white guy we know to go there. Some Portuguese might have seen it, but, you know, Salu goes a credit because he wrote it down.
- [21:33]
Robbie
Wow.
- [21:34]
Paul Hubbard
So he. He actually gets a concession from them that no man, unless endorsed by Sulu, is allowed to do any treaties, any mining, any farming, any settlement of the whites in that area, unless Mapondera and Salou agree. And this becomes known as the Mapondera teraringa. Concession of 1889. So this brings Salou to the attention of Rhodes for another reason. Not just because he knew the area that Rhodes had his beady little eyes on to take over for the British, but now he had made an overt imperial claim on behalf of the British, but with himself at the center of it. So Rhodes is determined to, to get Salou on his side. And Salud did not like Rhodes or De Beers or the British South African Company. It must be said, he, he, he sided with the Ndebele out of sympathies and also with the Tswana, because by this time as well, Salou has married a Swana woman and has at least two children with her and who traveled with him everywhere he went.
- [22:35]
Robbie
Even though he's this British imperialist.
- [22:38]
Paul Hubbard
Yes. No, no, no.
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Robbie
He's got a grow. He doesn't like this idea.
- [22:42]
Paul Hubbard
Yeah, yeah. And, and you know, but at the same time, with the Portuguese increasing their efforts into expanding their territory in southern Africa and with the publication of what's known as the rose colored map of 1889, where Portugal makes a paper claim to all of the territory between Angola and Mozambique on a map, they published it. And this spurs on Rhodes to say, no, no, no, we've got to get. Because with the Berlin Conference in 1885-1886, which set the rules for the colonization of Africa, one of the things you could publish whatever paper you wanted. If you had people on the ground that trumped any paper claims that you might say, oh, this is our sphere of influence. Oh, but there's British people living there. You, as the Portuguese don't have a claim. It was called the principle of effectivity. So Rhodes is determined to exploit this, which is why he gets a concession from Robin Guler called the Rudd concession, which was a mineral rights concession, not a land concession. But they twist the meaning of it to, you know, with a good lawyer. Words can mean what you want them to mean. And Rhodes had all the lawyers. So Rhodes uses that to get a royal charter to form a company in 1889 called the British South Africa Company, which has a royal charter from Queen Victoria. The shareholders and board of directors of the British South Africa Company is a who's who of British royalty at that time. You know, the Prince of Wales is involved. They've got dukes and earls and barons and, you know, all our hoity toity up there. So Rhodes has the British political power behind him, but now he needs people with experience on the ground. So he starts gathering up all these hunters and traders and Explorers who had worked and traveled through Mashonaland and bringing them onto his side. And one of the big holdouts was Sulu. But eventually Salou is seduced by two things. And the first important one from his consideration is that he be well compensated for his time. And Rose was a notorious cheapskate. You know, if he could get it for free, there's no way he'd pay. And if you could get it for less than what you thought, you know. So here Salou is determined that Rhodes is going to pay him properly. But the second thing that Salou is, is he is worried about the Portuguese taking over territory that Salou felt by rights should belong to the British. And he actually writes this fascinating article in 1891 for the London Times, you know, where he sets forth why he got involved with Rhodes. And if I can quote you a second, is that he said, you know, that England owes the acquisition of this rich country to the wisdom, foresight and strength of purpose of Mr. Rhodes is, I think, fully recognized in this country. That is Rhodesia, Zimbabwe. The knowledge that my years of travel as a hunter and collector of natural history specimens had given me of the topographical features of the country enabled me to play my part in the occupation of the land. And I hope that I may yet live to see that far off country grow and increase in prosperity. So Salou is hired, basically, it's always forgotten in this country. He's always remembered for the first job he was hired to do, which was to help guide the Pioneer column from South Africa to where Harare is today. So the Pioneer column was the group of men, there were no women allowed, who which numbered 500. There were approximately 200 pioneers who were farmers, doctors, builders, you know, those sorts of stuff. It's a very funny, amusing thing in the advert when they were advertising for people to join the Pioneer column. It's got, you know, wanted doctors, farmers, even priests. And all this right at the bottom it says lawyers need not apply. So, you know, they had their own ideas on who was a respectable settler at the time. And then there was about 300 men who were basically an army, but called the British South Africa Police. And that's the origin of our police force in Zimbabwe today. So this column is paid for and equipped by Cecil Rhodes. They were basically a military occupation force, despite all these peaceful professions dotting their ranks and. And Salu is hired to guide them from their base camp in South Africa all the way through to establish three forts along the way. And then the third and final fort would now become the capital of this new British held territory. So an overall command was a young man called Frank Johnson who had hunted and explored and prospected with Sulu in the 1880s. And the two did not like each other. Johnson hated Saloua and which is unusual in all of the reading I've ever done on Salu, I can count on one hand the number of people who actually disliked him, at least publicly. And Johnson made no secret of how he thought Salu was this washed up has been old fart. Even though you know, Johnson's 21, Salou in the 1880s is only in his 30s, you know, so it's not like, it's not like he's not pottering my dear old. But you know, Johnson just Caesar was
- [27:56]
Robbie
seniors in the African bush, probably put a bunch of age on you, you know, so.
- [28:00]
Paul Hubbard
Oh absolutely. And, but you know, Salou always looked younger than his years as well. But Johnson just disliked him because Salou also was a no nonsense man who had ingratiated himself with Rhodes by always speaking the truth to him. He never told Rhodes what he wanted, what Rhodes wanted to hear. He would tell him what was the reality. And one of the most striking examples of this is when in the Kimberley Club, you know, Rhodes and Johnson are plotting a military invasion of Matabil. Rather than this compromise of these people moving up, skirting around the border of Matabil land to settle in Mashonland, they were going to do this all out military invasion. And Salou says to Rhodes, you're crazy. You know, so many people are going to die, the Indobele will probably kill everyone and then what are you going to do? And he proposes this optional idea. And Salu goes, I mean Rhodes says to salute. He's like, do you think that's possible? And he says, yeah, I don't know which idiot's been telling you all this. And of course it turns out it was John's. So it didn't go well between them for their whole lives. But you know, Salu guides the column and he was exceptional at that job because of his own knowledge of the country. He also knew where the borders of Matabiland were, having had to wait at their border posts for so often on his hunting trips into the interior. But he was also known to many of the Ndebele whom they encountered on their march north. And together with Jamison Leanderstar. Jamison, Rhodes right hand man, was actually able to talk to them and calm things down if there was anything. But Salou was very worried about being overrun and attacked. By the Ndebele, he genuinely thought they would all be killed. And he never writes about this in his books, but one of his closest companions was a guy called Skipper Host, who publishes his memoirs as a book many years later. And he talks about having tea with Salou on one part of the journey. And they hear this whole commotion and shouts and shots around ring out, and he says, salute. Jumps up, grabs his rifle and says, come with me. They. They. They're gonna have at us. And they run around there and it's these guys chasing a rabbit through the. The middle of the camp. And of course, that's why there's all this noise, because they're trying to kill the rabbit. But it showed Salu's awareness of the potential danger when everyone else was a bit too casual, you know, at the time, he was always a.
- [30:20]
Robbie
Yeah, Laser faire, essentially. Everybody else versus him being on point.
- [30:25]
Paul Hubbard
Yes. So Salou actually stays with the British South Africa Company from 1889 until about 1890, May of 1892, give or take. There's a little bit of confusion on the exact dates here, but it's basically those three years because after he's led them north, when they're in sight of the area that they were going to build their third fort, which ends up being called Fort Salisbury today, the capital, Harare, Sulu actually peels off with several other company officials and heads east to the mountain range that is the Inyanga Vumba area today on the eastern side of Zimbabwe. And he helps negotiate a series of treaties with all the chiefs and leaders in that area to recognize the British rather than the Portuguese. So it's Sulu, together with several others that we have to thank that the eastern highlands are actually in our country and not in Mozambique. You know, our border. Yeah, our. Our border should be three. Sorry, 150km further inland than it is today. You know, Salou helps claim a lot of that territory by fair means, mostly because, again, he was known to. To a few of the guys there because of his hunting experience exploits in previous years. And then he also. Yet he still wasn't seen from a
- [31:49]
Robbie
Zimbabwean perspective as a colonizer.
- [31:53]
Paul Hubbard
Yeah, it's an interesting. He's remembered in Zimbabwe, if he's remembered at all, for the. The school and then the town and then as the hunter, you know, this, this role of his, which is only basically five years of his life. Yeah. Is. Is. Is largely forgotten and underappreciated. And I think it's also because most biographies you read of him jump over this they just say, oh, he led the pioneer column, Hoorah. And then they jump straight to him in the, in the war of 1896. They actually skip like this, this five year period of his life. And partly I think it's because, you know, a lot of information is, is hard to find unless you have access to the archives in Zimbabwe. Because again, we have a lot of his correspondence which I have yet to even begun to, to go through on a systematic, thorough basis. You know, I'm only in his correspondence. I'm still in the 1870s, you know, like reading the eye and. Because it takes time, you know, and, and he, he had and handwriting like mine. So it takes the time it takes to decipher it. You know, I can just imagine he was a lot more legible than I, I will give him that. So, you know, so Salou has that role and then he, he's actually employed to help scout roads and build access routes through the country. Like he actually helps open up several of the roads north of Harare towards the Mozambique border. He also opens up one of the main roads in the country today that takes you all the way through towards Kariba. He doesn't take it as far as Kariba, but why he's hired to do that is they realize very quickly that there's very little mineral wealth. So that's the interest of the company switches from gold to farming land. You know, that's, that's where the whites, you know, the, the original pioneers, most of them were here. Ah, there's gold lying on the surface, you know, land of silk and money. And they soon realized that it's land of pick and shovel. If you want to make a go of it, you know, and you know, the, the, the thing is, is he, he. One of the things is as well is that for that five years, Salou is also a very effective propagandist for Cecil Rhodes. He actually writes a lot of articles about why it's beneficial that the British South Africa Company and Rhodes in particular are having the impact and the right to do what they want to do in this part of the world. And he talks about, you know, like, he over, he's one of the guys who helps together with several missionaries create the overarching myth of the Indabele as these brutal overlords of the Zimbabwean plateau. Because he over emphasizes some of the severity of the raids and the attacks and all this. Like for example, he gives the completely nonsensical figure of 100,000 Shonas being killed by the Ndebele in a decade, which is, I don't know. That's one of the few times where I've caught him out where he is. Very clearly he's got an agenda and he believes it, so it rings true. But where that information comes from I don't yet know because he does seem to believe it. He actually repeats it a couple of times, you know, and, and obviously he, he, he had the experience to evaluate it for himself. But it is completely. If it killed 100, you know, at colonization, the population of the country was between 700 to 800,000 people total. So if they killed 100,000 people in a decade, there'd be bodies everywhere because there weren't enough people to bury them. You know what I mean? It's a. I would assume that there were raids and brutalities and killings and stuff like that, don't get me wrong. But to that extent. So that's one of the little things. But Salu, we will be nice to him today. We had to praise him, not to bury him.
- [35:32]
Robbie
So tell me, Salu, you mentioned in part one, the famous. Would you say there was a more famous expedition than Teddy Roosevelt with Salu?
- [35:47]
Paul Hubbard
No, not in his lifetime. You know, one of the things that happens to Salou is with the, with the publication of his book. He is the archetype for this. His, his early life in Africa is what this book is based on.
- [36:03]
Robbie
This is the children Solomon's Minds.
- [36:06]
Paul Hubbard
He is the archetype of Alan Quartermaine and in King Solomon's Minds and every subsequent book because, you know, everyone always remembers this one because it's the best one with Alan Quatermain, although I prefer the book of the same name. But Rider Haggard uses Seleu's life in Africa as the, the basis for the story of King Solomon's Mines. And when you read the whole story, it's basically Salu's 20s, his 1870s to early 1880s, that is the story of King Solomon's Mines. And when that book comes out, I think the, the original edition of King Solomon's Mines is 1884, 1885, thereabouts. Salou's book has been out for a while. Rider Haggard had read it and he retells the, he uses that book as a basis because when you go through it, I'm not. Rider Haggard is not plagiarizing, don't get me wrong, but the inspiration is so clear and then it's made very clear. You know, Haggard later on in his life would deny it, but when it's coming out, it's like, you know, relive the adventures in Africa like Salud by reading King Solomon's Mind. You know, that's some of the press about it and stuff like that. So that adds to Salud's reputation and luster because King Solomon's Mines is probably the best selling book of its decade, you know, in the world. It goes. That's another book that has never been out of print print. It's been made into all terrible movies. You know, I've yet to watch a really fun one. Although I do have a soft spot for the, the one with old. What's his name? Chamberlain. Richard Chamberlain, I think, which was filmed in Zimbabwe. But that's because I recognize so many of the places in kid Solomon's minds in Zimbabwe. But you know, the, the book itself is just a, a really thrilling classic colonial tale that was largely based on Salou's life. And you know, another, as a quick aside, you know, another author that was also a hunter who adored Salou and used him as a prototype for many characters was Wilbur Smith. You know, Sean Courtney in the first book, when the Lion Feeds is named for Courtney Salou, you know, and then when you read his series on the Ballantines, Zuga Ballantyne is Frederic Courtenay Salou. Even though Smith mentions Salu meeting Ballantine, you know, it's very clear Zuga is. And that that series of books is the story of. Of Salus adopted country of Zimbabwe that the, the classic four. And Wilbur Smith goes a bit on the other side, but that's another story. So the, the.
- [38:48]
Robbie
So this is happening to increase his law. Right? Wilbur Smith obviously much, much, much later, but King Solomon's Mines happening at the same time. And so Salu's law is getting bigger and bigger and bigger.
- [39:00]
Paul Hubbard
Yes, but it's this book, we go back to our hunter's wanderings in Africa here that, that brings Salou to a. The attention of this very young member of the New York Congress, you know, Theodore Roosevelt, who, who, you know, who begins a very rich correspondence with Frederick Courtney Salou. You know, I think Salou is. I've got to remember this correctly. Now, I can't remember when Teddy Roosevelt's born, but I think Salou's about 15 years older than him, give or take. Okay, so, so Salou, Saloo's book comes out. It's an absolute smash hit in the States as well. He actually does a couple of speaking tours in the States, very brief ones, you know, a couple of months and then he comes back to Europe and Then back to Africa after.
- [39:40]
Robbie
The books are talking tours of a couple of months.
- [39:44]
Paul Hubbard
Yeah. That's the travel time. You know what I mean? So. So, you know, the thing is, is the. The Wed. Roosevelt picks up this book. You know, he's already himself an accomplished naturalist. There is no doubt that Teddy Roosevelt is one of the greatest hunter naturalists in the history of North America, in my opinion. And that again, you need to find someone much cleverer than me to talk about him in that vein because, you know, I adore Roosevelt. Teddy a lot. Wrong. But a lot of. He was a man's man, much as our guy salute here as well. Teddy was another level. And so one of the things is, is he's a young New York State assembly member. Okay. And Roosevelt writes to Salou. And he. And I love this again, where's Salou
- [40:29]
Robbie
at this time receiving this correspondence? Is he in Salisbury? Is he in newly formed Fort Salisbury?
- [40:37]
Paul Hubbard
No. So, so, so Roosevelt starts writing to him in the 1880s. Okay. And because the book comes out 1881, so Roosevelt's. The earliest letter that we have between them in the Zimbabwean archives is from about 1885, 1886. Teddy's just won his first ever election, if memory serves. I might be slightly cockeyed on the dates. It might be a couple of years later. Just forgive me. So the humor is. Is so a lot of the correspondence, like you'd write to the publisher and then the publisher would forward it to Salou wherever he was at that moment in time, you know, so. And that was very common in those days. That that's how you'd actually find these people because you don't really, you know, it's like today you don't really give up your home address. So Salou. Roosevelt writes to Salou. And one of my favorite things in his. In his earliest letter is he says to him, and now this is. This is huge because Salou has no idea who Roosevelt is. Salou never learned anything about American politics in his whole life. Even when Roosevelt becomes president, you know, it's reported that he says to him, well, I guess that's quite an important job then. You know, like Salou couldn't care less about American politics throughout his life. But one of the things is, is Roosevelt writes to him and he says, you have the most extraordinary power of seeing things with minute accuracy of detail and then the equally necessary power to describe vividly and accurately what you have seen. That's Roosevelt's first known letter to Salou. And it becomes the first of genuinely hundreds of letters that these two would. Would swap over the next couple of decades, in fact, until Sulu's death, that they, they have this rich. And you can see so quickly it's, it's within a year that they writing then they don't meet for. For nearly 10 years after Roosevelt's first letter to Salou. But you can see they form this, this amazing bond through the correspondence and also through, through. They send each other books and articles and newspaper clippings. They also confess some of their. Their desires and dreams for both what they want to hunt. You know, like, hey man, I really want a brown bear. No. Well, geez, you should see the, the caribou up in Alaska. You know, like they're giving each other. Beefing up each other's dreams of. Of. Of what to hunt elsewhere in the world. But also they, they. They talk to each other a lot, a huge amount about conservation. And this really, really comes up from the. The 1890s because Salou leaves Africa in 1897, never to return until the First World War, okay, because of the events of 1896, which we call the Umvugela, the, the Matabele Rising, where after their conquest in 1893, which survived Lou had taken part in as a soldier, he's actually shot off his horse in one of the battles and recuperates very well and helps rescue a whole bunch of soldiers. Later on in that war of 1893, he. Sulu goes back to England, gets married, brings his young wife back to Rhodesia to work on a farm with him just south of Buo. And the two of them suffer extreme deprivation, financial loss, and really, really tough times during the War of 1896, between March and July of 1896, even though the war lasts much longer, Salou's role in it is done by then. He himself is incredibly brave, but his concern for his new wife and the rest of his family, because he never abandons his African family, that's the other thing which makes him a man's man. He takes his, his Tswana wife, refuses to leave, so she actually goes and she leaves him with the kids and he brings them to England. And Maddie, his, his, his. His wife or Gladys as she's often called as well. You know, they, he sets the kids up, educates them, and there's still a whole bunch of descendants there today in the UK as well, which was very unusual in those times, you know, so Salou, that's where he just gets a huge, you know, well done from me for that as well. So he never goes back after 1897. His wife comes back after he dies. But Salou never makes Africa his home again. England becomes the closest thing to a permanent home base for the rest of his life until the outbreak of the war. So one of the things that happens is Salu then starts to travel around a lot. You know, he's doing this, he's still doing museum collecting, but now he's starting to go all around Europe.
- [45:08]
Robbie
Engagements and stuff like that too, right?
- [45:12]
Paul Hubbard
Yes. And also hunting expeditions. So what he does now is he transfers his focus into Western Europe, Southeast. Not Southeast Asia, Southwest Asia. And into North America. Okay. So he now starts hunting there to collect specimens for museums. So, you know, he goes to, let's, you know, like, he goes to Hungary, he goes to Romania, he goes to Turkey, he goes all over Europe there. He goes into Norway, Sweden, Russia, you know, all these sorts of places, and he writes about it. This is the other part when you read his stuff there. I've never been to any of these places, but just like those who read his stuff on Africa, I'm there with him. You know, that's how good a writer he is as well, when you're reading about this stuff. But, and he does, he goes into Iraq, Iran, he goes all around the Black Sea area. Again, he goes into the Caucasus Mountains. You know, this is all through the 1890s. Okay. And into the, the early 1900s. And then he, he, he makes a trip to North America. So for, for hunting before this, he had been to do speaking engagements. And in fact, there's conflicting information about this. And I've written to them the other day to ask for some clarity, but he's actually elected a member of the Bunin Crockett Club in 1897, of which Roosevelt's the founder. You know, Roosevelt is the founder of that amazing club of hunting gentlemen, as it were. So he is elected as a professional member, which was kind of amazing. And I, I stand to be corrected. Which is what I've also written to ask them to check in their archives. But I think he's the first one not to have hunted in North America to, to be made a full member. But I, I, I stand to be corrected on that. It's just from my reading of, of their stuff on the Internet and Salu's own bits and pieces, it might be true. I'll wait to see.
- [47:04]
Robbie
Through this entire time, he's still communicating with Teddy, right?
- [47:07]
Paul Hubbard
Yes, but only they never. And they keep trying to make it work. So like, when he goes over in 1897, Salou has been left near a pauper by the losing all of his property and cattle, and all this during the war of 1896. So he's only got £400 to travel with his wife around Canada and the States. And what happens is he actually writes to Teddy and he says, right, I'm coming for a visit. And. And then he gets offered a paid speaking engagement to go from Toronto to Vancouver, you know, this whole line of speaking engagements. And he says, ah, sorry, I can't come to the States this time because I've got to take this. It's money. And Roosevelt's like, of course, man, we all need money. Go for it, my mate. We'll make another plan. So Tsulu, actually, you know, he goes hunting and doing his speaking tour. And I've just done a couple of things here because I can't remember this all in my head, so I had to write it down. All right. But you know what's kind of fun is so he goes his first port of call when he wants to go hunting. So he does his speaking thing and then he goes into Wyoming. He then goes hunting in the Rocky mountains, okay. In 1897 and again in 1898. He then hunts through all of eastern Canada from 1900 to 1901. He goes to Alaska in 1904. And I just have to show you, this is one of my favorite pictures of Frederick Courtney, silly. Now, this is 1904. Remember, he's born 1851. Okay, so he's 53. And this picture here, and this is him helping pull his canoe up the Yukon river like this by, you know, by himself. This is not a posed thing. The photographer. There's his mate in the canoe behind him there. And this is him pulling this thing up with all of his kit and gear and everything, like in the. In the. In the, you know, the Native American way at that time, pulling it all the way upstream because the current was too strong to pedal. And this is him, you know, like. Yes. So, you know, when he's up here, he. He's looking for a lot of stuff. So, like, when he's going there, he. He's collecting specimens. So he's also very picky. He's not just shooting anything because he wants a caribou for himself. It has to be museum quality. This is also how his. His attitude to hunting has evolved as well. He's still going to hunt, but now what's the. What's the point of it? You know, it's still the fun. It's the outdoors of it and all this. But now he wants specimens for the museum. So he, he's doing bird, bird hunting and collecting for various specimens mainly at this time of his Life now from 1897 for the next decade or so. Most of his stuff is for the Natural History Museum in, in Britain. You know, that's 90% of his attention. He still does some stuff for like the Vienna Museum and the Berlin Museum and stuff like that, but his focus is on, on the Natural History Museum partially because of his good working relationship. They also paid him better and he was also able to draw on their scientific expertise to help inform his own interests and passions as well. So there's a lovely relationship there that they acknowledge today as well to this day. I mean so when he goes there, you know, he's, he's looking for, for the various types of sheep, he's looking for moose, caribou, he's also taking all the different birds, both their eggs as well as, you know, adult specimens as well. And this is the amazing thing is Salou was a self taught taxidermist which is what brings him into contact with the main publisher for much of the rest of his life, which was Roland Ward. You know, one of the legends in the hunting industry. Roland Ward and, and Frederick Courtney Salou have the most incredible relationship. Roland Ward actually publishes Salus next few few books as well and, and also equips him out with everything he needs for his collecting expeditions. And one of the, just as an aside because it's popped in my head is that according to Roland Ward, the man himself is that Salu shot more record breaking animals than anyone else in the history of that of his company up until the day Salud died. Nobody else. And, and on as many continents as well like Salu held not the, not the biggest of, you know, of every single thing, but all of them were in the top like whatever he harvested for the museums and all these things were always in the top 10 of Roland Ward's records up to that time. And indeed, even if you go through the more modern Roland Ward, you know, book of big game and all that Salus name still appears and we now are 100, you know, 20 years since he was seriously hunting. And you know, some of the stuff that he had the eye for is still in the record books. You know, again, cool new Iing amazed. So one of the things that I also, you know, enjoy is Sulu is also reveling when you read his books. You know, he actually writes two books about his time in North America and, and it includes the first book includes some of his stuff in Europe and Asia and. And the Middle east, which is called Travel Eastern A Sport and Travel east and West. And that comes out in 1901. And that is. That is one of my favorites of all of the books to lose writes. My absolute favorite is the first one, you know, Hunter's Wanderings in Africa. That's. That's just the. The pinnacle of his writing. But my second favorite is his book that comes out in 1907, which is hunting Trips in British North America. You know, having been to the States
- [52:28]
Robbie
and that was published by Roland Ward,
- [52:31]
Paul Hubbard
if I think the first edition was. Yes. And then it's been so many updates and changes and stuff like that. You. The Boone and Crockett Club have actually just reissued it as a collector's book, so you can actually buy a facsimile reprint of that from them at the moment. I've ordered one. And we'll see. We'll see if it arrives and all that. Because I love, like I told you, I like those sorts of things. There's always something else. So you know, the order, something like that.
- [52:54]
Robbie
Send it to me and I'll bring it to Zim to make sure that it gets to you not relying on freaking the postal service.
- [53:02]
Paul Hubbard
We make a planet. No, that's very kind, Robbie, thank you. I'll keep that in mind. But be careful. As you can see, I like books, but no, that's very cool. Thank you so much. But you know, the. So. So. So now what happens is it's so salute. Is on those trips.
- [53:19]
Robbie
That's time going back to sort of the Teddy thing. At this time, Teddy Roosevelt is the President of the United States.
- [53:25]
Paul Hubbard
He's. He's been rising through the ranks. You know, Roosevelt, if I remember, he goes from a new New York assemblyman, then he becomes an assistant secretary to the Navy, then he becomes governor of
- [53:38]
Robbie
New York, and then 1898.
- [53:42]
Paul Hubbard
That's right. Yeah. So salou. And then, of course, I can't remember when he goes and does the Rough Riders, and then he comes back and then he stands as vice president with McKinley. Because Roosevelt was a useful bulwark against some of the more radical elements in the party at the time. Yeah. 20.
- [54:03]
Robbie
The vice president of the United States, 1901, with McKinley.
- [54:07]
Paul Hubbard
But then when McKinley is shot and killed in Buffalo, New York, Roosevelt then becomes president in 1901. So now they. Now they correspond from 1901. It's. It's, you know, president and Salou corresponding. And Teddy keeps telling him, listen, I Only want to serve two terms, assuming I can win the election for a second term, and then I'm out of here. So if you want to come and visit me while I'm still someone of influence and interest and all this, you better come now. Like, he's pestering him from 1898, you know, when he's. When he's a governor and all this sort of stuff. And salud. They could just never make it work until 1905. And that's when he gets to host him at the White House for a couple of nights. And, you know, Roosevelt, let me just tell you now, Roosevelt was never a man who hid his emotions. He never. He never. He was always upfront about what he felt, how he felt, and also, you know, and he could not wait to communicate joy, especially one of my favorites.
- [55:04]
Robbie
Could you imagine being a fly on the wall of the Oval Office if there was an Oval Office at that time? I don't even know what the White House looked like. Lou coming in and Teddy rising, going, holy shit, this is the guy I've been communicating with for the last 15 years via. It's like a pen pal that you've never met.
- [55:30]
Paul Hubbard
Yeah, and it's his hero. That's the other thing Roosevelt worshipped is too strong a word for a man such as Roosevelt. But Roosevelt adored Salut both for his. His. His hunting exploits and all the rest of it, but also for what he learned of him as a man. You know, he. He was another one who. Who spoke of Salu as being honest to a fault, you know, like. And he also found Salu to be incredibly noble in. In mirroring many of Roosevelt's own interests, passions, and beliefs as well. And, you know, this is. This is something that I really love because it's something that I really hope to publish by next year, but, you know, time and opportunity.
- [56:15]
Robbie
You got an elephant treatise between then and now.
- [56:17]
Paul Hubbard
Yeah. Well, that's why you're number three. I told you, the elephants is number three, Roosevelt, and Salou is number four.
- [56:23]
Robbie
Number four.
- [56:24]
Paul Hubbard
No, number seven. Now I've got to finish a bloody book writing as well. But, you know, I just want to tell you, this is. This is something that I've taken a bit of stick for when I've spoken about this in public, but the evidence is there and I'm working on it to bring it to academic quality for publication so that it becomes accepted. But podcast here, let's just talk, you know, so one of the amazing things is the two of them exchange hundreds of letters. Okay, Now a Lot of the letters Roosevelt receives, of course, are in the States, and they're all the ones he writes are here in the Zimbabwean archives. And when I've gone through all the biographies ever published of Salu, nobody's ever looked at all this correspondence as a unit. Okay. Now, one of the amazing things the two of them are writing to each other, what everyone has always focused on, which I promise we'll get to before the end of this episode, is Roosevelt's safari in Africa. But for me, what is so much more impactful is the relationship that these two develop about the ideas of conservation, of the environment, of wildlife, and of our role as people in that necessity. Okay. And Roosevelt, you know, he was an incredible naturalist in his own right. You know, there's so many stories just like Salou of him as a young boy and how he would collect birds, eggs and reptiles and he would climb trees to, you know, find a rare lizard and, you know, all this sort of stuff. He went hunting, you know, from a very young age. He was passionate about the outdoors. And he also, you know, had a deep respect for, even though it didn't always show in his political career, but there was a respect there for the knowledge and beliefs of Native Americans. He also had a huge interest in seeing massive parts of America, as he puts it, being protected from prospector and driller.
- [58:12]
Robbie
Well, hold on, let me ask. Given what we talked about in part one, and given the time period that these two guys are interacting from a writing perspective, it's not a far fetched idea because Salou has literally just gone through the same thing that America is going through in the late 1880s. 1890s is a decimation of wildlife across the board. From a commercial perspective. Solution has gone through that for elephants and has changed careers because of it. There has to be evidence, communications of them discussing wildlife population declines and how
- [58:54]
Paul Hubbard
do we, what would we do if
- [58:56]
Robbie
we had the brothers to solve this, to put a plan in place?
- [59:01]
Paul Hubbard
Are there things like that? You have read my mind. Have you read his letters? Because I have those letters where they are talking about that. And one of the ones where it comes up organically is Roosevelt's excited that Salou is going up into eastern Canada for hunting. And he says to him, geez, like, you know, when I was up there in 10 years earlier, you know, the moose were as common as flies. And Salu rides back to him and says, my mate, we walked for three days and we saw four moose. You know, I don't know what you're talking about. And so Rizava is like, what, sorry, what's been happening up there? And he starts to do his own investigations. He also gets the, the Boone and Cocket Club members involved in saying, what the. What's going on here? Where are we just killing everything? Of course, Salou is also. Him and Salou also exchanged notes on the decimation of the bison years before them as well. But they're also looking at, you know, the, the decline of so many bird species because one of the things that they're also swapping with each other, because we don't. In the Zimbabwean archives, we've got some of them, but there's all these off prints and copies of articles. You know, Teddy's obviously getting secretaries to type out whole copies of certain things after newspapers and all that, but. And academic things. They're also sending each other books. And Saloo's saying, oh, man, I want to go up into the Rocky Mountains. You know, that was his dream in America, was to hunt in the Rockies, which he does do, as we had mentioned. And Roosevelt's telling him, oh, my God, you know, when we were up there, the, the, the moose population and the bears, you know, like I, One of my mates took a bear of this size and that was. He was laughed at because it was seen as small. And salute comes back and says, well, geez, like, you know, this is what our, this is what we experienced. So they, they, they both are. Roosevelt, because of his jobs now, is becoming a bit more sedentary and is not as much of an explorer as he was in his youth. So Salou's been on the ground and is telling him stuff that he's then percolating through the US Government to much frustration with the Bureau of Lands, which was the main thing in charge in those days, if memory serves. You know, American government institutions confuse me a lot, a lot of the time as to who they are, what they do. Over years, I've still got to learn a lot more about that. But the fascinating thing is they are both pushing each other into a conservation mindset through their shared horror and sorrow and helplessness at that time about what to do to look after these, These creatures, their environments and all the rest of it. And they both, however, become such strong advocates. That's one of the purposes of TR in 1887, forming the. The Boone and Crockett Club, was to have these guys as. What, what do you call them, as conservation hunters, as we would think of them in the modern world, as conservation
- [61:49]
Robbie
leaders, thought leaders in the conservation space.
- [61:53]
Paul Hubbard
Exactly. And, you know, Salu has already had these experiences in Africa as you talk about, not just with elephant, but like with hippo, with giraffe, with ostrich even, and, you know, and. And so many other things. So he himself, in 1900, forms the. The British Society for the Preservation of Fauna of the Empire. And that becomes our first conservation organization in Zimbabwe because Salou actually personally opens a branch of it here. Okay. And. And this becomes this massive organization throughout the British Empire, which is made up of all, you know, the members are all the aristocracy. There's no. There's no povo, you know, the peasants down in this membership, but these are the people with power. And so they. The ones who start setting in place legislation to control hunting. And initially it's only targeted at the whites by Sulu's insistence, the legislation and stuff, because he says a lot of the time they're the problems. You know, they. We need licenses, we need bag limits, which Sulu, his name is mud. Hey.
- [62:57]
Robbie
From.
- [62:57]
Paul Hubbard
From 1900 to like 1904, he is hated in much of the establishment because of advocating for bag limits, advocating for looking at trophies rather than just shooting every animal that you see. Also advocating that certain areas be ring fenced, to use a modern term, to stop any hunting there for long periods of time. You know, it says we can't ban hunting. He says that that way lies madness, because it's a human necessity is how Salus sees it. But he also says, you know, we have to have game laws and regulations because there are many of us who are not capable of doing it for ourselves. And this is the same thing that's starting to happen in the States now. Teddy Roosevelt, when he becomes vice president, that's one of his portfolios that he actually asks for. It's one of his conditions for. For accepting the ticket because he did not want the vice president. This is what I love about Roosevelt as well. He never wanted to be a politician, but by God, he was good at it. You know, it's. It's. He hated the job, but yes, it's amazing.
- [63:58]
Robbie
It'd be like me and you having conversations and dreams about like, how could we change the world? Like, how do we change this thing that we love? And without any foresight or any foreknowledge, one of us becomes the most powerful person in the world and says, okay, I'm gonna do it.
- [64:17]
Paul Hubbard
Well, add comfort tea as well, you know. And, you know, the thing is, is what's kind of amazing. And so, so what I'm. What I'm trying to.
- [64:27]
Robbie
Fascinating at Salu and Teddy, different continents, same mindset, same issues influenced. Maybe not. You know, I'm thinking more from a solution perspective, influencing Teddy. Perspective, right. Whether, you know, whether it was just same thing happening at the same time or SLU had a lot more impetus in Teddy's thought processes or things that he wanted to do, we don't know. Right.
- [64:56]
Paul Hubbard
But we've got very good glimpses because of how many surviving letters there are and because I've got Teddy's replies to Salou and Salou's replies to Roosevelt. Boy, oh boy. I promise you we will have to do another chat specifically on this whole issue. But what my argument is is that, you know, Salou and Teddy have this, this, this feedback loop with each other and they, they're also connecting others with, with each other with. Because they were both quite, you know, even, even before Teddy's president. They, they are very well influenced, very connected. Sorry, well connected to influential people. You know, like Salud's hunting with Earl Grey and the Earl of Abercorn and stuff like this, you know, high ups in the British Royal Society. And he's able to now start talk, involved with the Society for the Preservation of Wildlife and so on, which, you know, their journal still exists today. And you, you, you probably have read it given your own scientific background. The society that Salou founds, because the journal today is called Oryx, it's the Oryx Journal is the, the original journal of the wildlife preservation, you know, that, that British society. So, and what's quite fun is both the Boone and Crocket Club and the Wildlife Service Preservation Society in the uk both become known as the Society of Penitent Butchers in the press because it's
- [66:20]
Robbie
now the hunter became conservationists.
- [66:22]
Paul Hubbard
Exactly. And it's a great name. Salu loves it because he says, damn right, you know, that's the, you know, and he says and watch us work. So, so, you know, with Roosevelt, what amazes me when he becomes president, okay, he doesn't stop his correspondence with Frederick Courtney Salou and in fact one of the things that's happening when, so you imagine being President of the United States, you know, and, and even in that, in that year, there's a lot going on. There's, there's huge amount of responsibility, there's all sorts of stuff and one of the things that Roosevelt's doing is having this correspondence with Salou about which areas of the states should be protected. Okay. He's actually looking to salute now. Salud is not the only one don't, don't get me wrong that Roosevelt's talking to a huge quantity of local knowledge in the States, his own officialdom, his own connections and stuff. But he's also writing to sue, hey, you've been up there, you've been into this area, this area, in this area. What do you think about this? What do you think about that? And Salute's like, yeah, no, geez, if you could look after that. And no, because Salu's also been sharing with him horror stories of Europe and about the mining industry. That's what their big worry was with the conservation of a lot of this land in the States and in Africa wasn't so much hunting after a time because, you know, the population stabilize, could stabilize quite quickly and come back and all. It's the pollution and impact of mining that is a huge worry for them. So Roosevelt's writing is saying, well, you know, we've got this and I don't know and this and that. So he's actually not asking for advice, but he's saying, you know, I'm just sharing this. What do you say? What do you think? And Saleh's writing back to him. And so within his first eight months of his first term as president, now, you know, Roosevelt declares 150 national forests, 51 federal bird reservations, four national game reserves, 18 national monuments, and 24 reclamation projects, okay, adding 230 million acres under public protection from the federal government. And a huge quantity of those areas were chosen in part because of Salus discussions with Roosevelt. So here you have this guy having this, this impact on American national parks society somewhere, huh? Huh. It's amazing, isn't it, that, that there's this positive impact from this friendship, this unlikely friendship when you think about it, you know, between these two great men and, and you know, Roosevelt was, was a huge admirer. So when he finally gets Salou into the White House like you talked about in 1905 when they finally there for those, those precious few nights together, it's just like, wow, he puts aside everything. The whole government has to pause while Roosevelt's having tea with Sulu. You know, that's, well, Sulu's having tea, Roosevelt's having coffee and, and you know, the stories in that, I was, I always want to know and I'm trying, I'd love to. I'm sure there must be a book somewhere in the, in the, the Smithsonian archives or the, the National Archives in the state where it'll tell you which room they sat in, because I could just see the Two of them, everyone's gone to bed. All the servants, the employees, everyone's at bed. And the crew, they were sitting there telling stories. And Salu had traveled with a lot of trophies at this point. Pretty much, yes. But I'm sure he, I, you know what, I have a feeling for this sort of occasion.
- [69:49]
Robbie
Exactly. They would have cracked someone.
- [69:51]
Paul Hubbard
There's no way you're not having a, a wee dram in the, in the White House with, with a man. And that visit, you know, you think about it like sometimes never meet your heroes is such a common adage. But for the two of them, all that time that they had together in the White House, which neither of them ever write about much except in their letters, okay. It is just the most remarkable, remarkable thing. The affection for each other is increased a thousandfold and they just continue on and you know, their correspondence becomes quite erratic for the, the second part of Teddy's. I mean, for Teddy's second term. Okay. Because you know, there's much, there's so much going on in America, in the States at that time that, you know, their correspondence dwiddles to only a handful of letters each year until 1908, where, sorry, late 1907 into 1908, because then Roosevelt is planning the greatest safari in the history of America, in my opinion. Africa, we've had others, but Roosevelt safari here at that time is just earth shatteringly important to the development of tourism, to the development of hunting as a profession as we understand it today, to the development of American interest in the safari industry in Africa as a whole. Can all be dated from this expedition. And you know, Roosevelt, it's one of the other things that I find so charming and I could send you some of the copies I've got of some of these letters for you to read or even did episode, you know, another episode to do just. I'm not trying to make work for you or me, but is to actually talk through the logistics of the safari because that's another whole thing that I just think is absolutely wonderful because Rusula is taking the time.
- [71:43]
Robbie
Sorry, how long was the safari?
- [71:47]
Paul Hubbard
It's. For heaven's sake. It's five months, I think in total. Once he's on land, you know, there's still the months to travel there. Like, you know, when they go by mail steamer. Because Roosevelt crosses to the uk, he actually spends a couple of nights at Salou's house now near Woking in England. And for Roosevelt, he actually says of this visit that it was better than the White House. His Salou's house was a living museum at this time, full of trophies from around the world, his massive egg collections, butterfly collection. You could just imagine. I don't think there would have been. Nobody slept for those couple of nights, you know what I mean? Because there's too much to look at and talk about and walk and travel and talk, you know, so that's another fantastic time that they have together. But the whole planning of this expedition and what makes me laugh is you can see the, the cultural differences. Like Roosevelt writes to Salut. He says to him, you know, what food do you think I should, you know, should take with me? Because it took Roosevelt several letters to con to, to get Salou to agree to help with the entire planning of the expedition. But Salou had already taken another contract for a collecting expedition for, for a couple of museums in East Africa at the same time. That's why he couldn't actually go with Roosevelt. But he admits in a let. That's the official reason given in the press and all this. But Salou actually admits in a letter to Roosevelt that he says, you will travel with far too many people. I, I enjoy the bush as I know it, which is myself and my couple of guys going with me out there. And Roosevelt says, yes, I wish, but the position does not allow, you know, my position does not allow for such privilege. So, so what's amazing is, is, you know, so the culture clashes in the. My favorite one so far that I've been reading is about the food where, you know, like Salou puts in all the classic British stuff like he's talking about powdered beets and he's talking about, you know, we need 50 gallon tins of tea and we also recommend this type of. And you can check it, Roosevelt's one letter from Saloui. I mean, yeah, he crosses out in his own hand and he puts coffee and underlines it like twice instead of tea. And then there's also the, the thing with the powdered beets. They just crossed off and are never replaced. And then Roosevelt says he doesn't want any alcohol on the, on the shooting trip, just a couple of cases of champagne to, to celebrate important occasions. And Salou writes to him and says, believe me, you're gonna want, you know, I've spent time with you, you're gonna want to make sure you've got enough booze with you. And Roosevelt in his head underneath that letter, he like quietly is tripling all the, and adding in like, okay, another couple of cases of malt whiskey. And you know, because he Preferred whiskey to bourbon. A lot of the time you drink both and enjoy both, but, you know, there's that sort of stuff. So, you know, it's just. It's just the funniest thing. But, you know, Salou is just. There's genuinely probably more than 60 letters between the two of them. And this is why Roosevelt's still president. Hey, planning. And one of the fascinating things is, is that Roosevelt, what do you call it, has to pay for this trip somehow. So he's actually offered a huge amount of money by a couple of the newspapers to write for them. And he actually says, no, no, no. I think Scribner's magazine, even though they offered him a lot less money, was a much more genteel place to publish such accounts and all that. And so he, because he was actually Roosevelt, was offered a hundred thousand dollars by, I'm trying to remember the name of the newspaper now to publish all of his stuff with them. And he says, no, you're like a rag. You know, I'd rather be like, can you imagine a president telling a newspaper you're actually a rag? You know, with the power of the media and stuff? And then he says, no, I'll go for Scribners because it's a much more gentlemanly publication. And then also Scribner's let him have the book contract. And, you know, Roosevelt goes on to produce two of my favorite books, which I have in first editions and owned by former Secretary of the Navy, which is, of course, his African Game Trails, you know, and signed Paul. Not by Roosevelt. No, but this is signed by. He was a commander when he buys the books, and later goes on to much more serious Pavel, who goes on to. I think he goes on to become a Deputy Secretary in the Navy later on in his career. So I love the idea that one Secretary of the Navy has bought another former Secretary of the Navy's books and read them and love them. And this is the. The two volumes. And you can always tell the first editions because the edges are always unevenly cut in the binding process. That's how you know it's a first edition, first printing, because they screw that up, which I love because it's such an iconic thing. And, you know, when you, when you read these, you know, they. Roosevelt writes as well as Salou, in my opinion, of his entire safari, in fact, in some cases, better eye for detail in certain things. But he's got the advantage of several more years of prepping for his trip. And Roosevelt, unlike Seleut, had some early training in the natural sciences, but those two books. And one of my favorite quotes in there is when he talks about Salu in volume one when he's talking about him and says no greater hunter has ever lived. Which is just to me, when you get a man like that again saying that, that's not praise, that's reality. You know what I mean? It's. And, and you know, the, the two of them. Salou. What? I'll show you one of my favorite things because I have the original postcard somewhere but I've, I've lost it.
- [77:19]
Robbie
How did she lose it?
- [77:21]
Paul Hubbard
I put it in a book to keep it. I don't know which one.
- [77:25]
Robbie
Oh, and you're like, I'll remember this, I'll remember this. It'll be in this book of the 80,000 books that you have.
- [77:34]
Paul Hubbard
So anyway, but luckily I did scan it. All right, okay, good. So just for fun again, I can send you the proper thing. But this is the postcard in color here. But this is my favorite picture of the two of them. And when you look at that, that's the two of them traveling on the steamer ship down to, to East Africa where you know, Salou is traveling with Roosevelt from the UK down to, to East Africa.
- [77:57]
Robbie
But they split off because he has his contractual.
- [78:00]
Paul Hubbard
Yes, he's got his contract so far.
- [78:02]
Robbie
Yeah.
- [78:03]
Paul Hubbard
Roosevelt has his hunting and everything involved. What I absolutely adore with this, this picture here in particular is that you could tell Salou, look at those faces. There's Roosevelt laughing his head off. And you look at Salu's face with that impish grin. He has just finished the conclusion of an. Either an epic story or a fantastic joke and either would have gotten that reaction out of the two of them. And then the, the picture here is a lot more of a formal setting on the deck of the ship showing there's Kermit Roosevelt there together with Teddy. That's Salou in the, in the center there, you know, and you can discussing
- [78:39]
Robbie
some sort of part of the logistics of the, of the trip or something like that.
- [78:43]
Paul Hubbard
Absolutely. And you could just see it. It's a hand tinted postcard as well. That's why it's in color like that, you know, and what I just love with that is it just shows the, the, the easy familiarity which the two of them had as well. You know, Salou couldn't have cared less if Roosevelt was American President. Even if he came on safari as American president. You know, he, he really, really had a, this, this, this mutual respect and bond between them foreswore Any titles and, and places in life, however form, however big and important you might have been, you know, and the one thing I love on that trip as well is, you know, Roosevelt writes. It's not in the books, but it's in several of his articles that he writes for Scribners about all the, some of the stories that Salu tells him, which are also quite fascinating because Salu never puts them in any of his books. So, you know, I love that, that we've also got this retelling of, of some of the legends that Salu felt were, Ah, you know, don't worry, that's not really important. Roosevelt's like, what my mate, you did that. You shot that. You went there. What. You know, you could see the, the humor there. And you know, I really think it'll be quite fun to do a thing on, on Roosevelt's great safari as a, as a talk again because as you can tell, I've been, I've been reading up a lot about it. But what's also absolute, what I absolutely adore as well, is just before Roosevelt's going on his safari, okay, is he is pestering Salou like you cannot believe, and says to him, listen, I've been reading some of the letters where this is in 1906 that Roosevelt's writing to him and saying, listen here, my mate, I have been reading all of your notes that you've been telling me about the differences in litwy and the potential subspecies of giraffe and the behavior of lions versus hyenas and also the expansion and contraction of the tsetse fly belts and also your experiences hunting in Europe. You really need to put this into a book. And Salus says to him, I'll only put it in a book if you write the Ford. And here is that book. This is my. This is the. One of the finest books on Africa ever written, in my opinion. African Nature, Notes and Reminiscences. This comes out 1908. I don't know where my first edition is. This is the reprint, hence the pretty cover. This is a limited edition reprint. But one of the things I love is Salud dedicates the book to Teddy Roosevelt. And just to give you an idea, he says to Theodore Roosevelt, President of the United States, this book is respectfully dedicated not only because it was entirely owing to his inspiration and kindly encouragement that it was written, but also both because both in his private and public life, he has always won the sincere admiration and esteem of the author, which is just amazing. Then, then I cannot imagine a President. And I'm going to be rude for a. Very rude for a second here, but I cannot imagine a sitting U. S. President in the last. Since him. All right, Roosevelt having the time to sit, read through this entire manuscript and then write a forward where he engages with so many aspects of the book. Like, for example, he's saying here that
- [81:57]
Robbie
he has read it. It's clear that he has read it in the four.
- [82:00]
Paul Hubbard
It's not just the four.
- [82:02]
Robbie
It's just not like a fruit, you know, a, you know, whatever. An eloquent, you know, endorsement. It's endorsement of Salu. Yeah.
- [82:12]
Paul Hubbard
And, you know, like this. I love this. One of the Most interesting of Mr. Salus chapters is that containing his notes on wild dogs, on hunting hounds, and on cheetahs. Especially noteworthy are his experiences in actually running down and overtaking both the wild dog and the cheetah, having run them to exhaustion. These experiences are literally inexplicable in our present knowledge, and it is all the valuable to have them recorded. Like, he's. That's on. That's in one sentence in this book. And he's. He's drawing attention, you know, like. And you go, well, wow. So that's the. That's their relationship and their many kindnesses. And Salou also offers a huge amount of encouragement to Roosevelt when, you know, African game trails is coming to be published, because, you know, Roosevelt had made a living writing a lot as well. You know, it wasn't like this was his first ever book. You know, he had written several books before this. But one of the fun things as well is, you know, he writes the forward. He writes most of this book while on his hunting safari. You know, the forward to the book is written in while he's sitting in Khartoum waiting to go home at the, you know, towards the conclusion of the safari, he's already got the book ready to go to the printers. And the humor is in the book throughout. He keeps saying, oh, this is just like when Mr. Salou mentioned this about white rhino. Oh, you know, oh, Salou would have loved a trophy like this. So you could also see there's that conversation between them. And, you know, I think we probably should think about winding it up, but I don't know if you're happy with that. But what I wanted to just mention was, you know, Salou's later life after the great. The great roosevelt expedition of 1909, you know, 1910, you know, Salou for the next four years of his life is mainly in England. He still does a couple of hunting trips all around there. And then he comes back to Africa and the. In 1915. Sorry. And the reason why it comes back to Africa in early 1915 is because of World War I. You know, Salou, when, when Saloub. When war breaks out. Salou is 65, okay. And he, he is, is determined to do his part because he saw the war as a. Just one to defend against German imperialism. You know, he had, he had switched his antipathy from the Portuguese to the Germans. And in terms of having seen a little bit in Tanzania about the brutality of German colonial rule at that time, he was not a fan. And also their rapaciousness in Europe as it was growing prior to World War I. So one of the things is the day wars declared, Saleh is at home. And so he goes the next day to present himself for war service. And the recruiter at the time immediately stamps his card, which I just love this because the card was preserved for a time is where it just says age prohibitive against employment. And Salu is so mad that he says, well, I'll find another way. So he actually as, as the rest of Britain does, he does what he can and you know, in the home defenses and stuff. And then he hears about the war in, in East Africa and he immediately volunteers through the home office and says a foreign office sorry and says I'm going off to, to Africa. And the British are desperate because in East Africa they are facing one of the greatest generals ever to have lived in. One of my top 10 personal heroes in history, which is Paul Font Leto Forbeck, who to me is one of the greatest people ever to have walked on this planet. And I know that's very high praise. Salu is in the top 10 as well, just for, you know, and, and you know, Fondleto Forbeck is a general without compare. In his entire military career, he never lost a battle ever. So, so he just dismantles the British forces in East Africa. And so they desperate to have people with ex. Experience on the ground. And so Salou is, is naturally incorporated. And what they do is they. The Foreign Office, the War Office, as it becomes known, mobilizes every old Africa hand from East Africa who had any type of experience there. And they form this, this unit called the Legion of Frontiersmen, of which Salou is the captain. And the, the nickname for them was the Old and the Bold. And these guys, you know, there's Americans in there, there's Canadians, there's British, there's Zimbabweans, Zambians, there's all people from all over the British Empire and ex Empire into this unit. And none of them are soldiers. Sulu was one of the most experienced, militarily speaking, because of his previous battles in Zimbabwe and all that. But there was a lighthouse keeper, there was a circus performer, there was a professional photographer. These guys are going to go and fight one of the greatest generals in human history. And yet off they go. And they are just this motley assortment was just incredible. And they take part together with just like the Germans, they use black askaris to fight with them, to whom a lot of the credit in the fighting must actually go. You know, the whites are mainly the officers and the, the rebs, as some people would call them today. And the, the. But you know, Salud puts himself on the front line all the time, scouting, fighting and leading his men who grew to love him. When you read especially this book here, this is, this is the first ever biography of says, oh, Frederick Courtney Salud. And it comes out the, the. This is a reprint as well. This comes out a year after Salou's death. Okay. This is written by JG Miller.
- [88:03]
Robbie
Do we know exactly where he died? Obviously we do.
- [88:07]
Paul Hubbard
I'll get to that in a second. But the, the, the most incredible thing is, is he, he, Salou, in 1916 wins the DSO, the Distinguished Service Order for bravery in how he had led his men against several German attacks. And the war in East Africa after that, degenerates into, well, had degenerated into trench warfare. Okay. In certain areas of Tanzania, northern Zambia and in Kenya. You know, the, the war like in Europe had stalemated into this trench like warfare. Although Von Letter Forbeck in East Africa from 19. Late. Sorry from 1917 was to shake it up into a more modern guerrilla fighting. But that's another story. So, so Salou is. By early January 1917, Salou and his, his men are actually entrenched at the village of Behobeho in British in East Africa, which is Tanzania. And, and the, the trenches have been dug and there's been heavy firing between the two sides at that time. And so on the 4th of January, Salou actually takes his men along the ridgeline in that area trying to circumvent one of the trenches. And he could not see the Germans who are lying down in the scattered grass among all the trees as they were approaching the German lines. And so Salou lifts his head up to get a better look and the first bullet actually hits the binoculars out of his hand and his head is flung sideways in the second bullet takes him through the head and he falls down and having. Having been killed. And what's so amazing is his men go berserk. They. They lose it and they charge the German lines under incredible heavy fire of machine guns and rifles and mortars and every other thing you can imagine at that time. And they, they just. They go berserk with the loss of their leader and all fire after. They, they. They attack the German trenches. They. They attack again. All fighting comes to an end for that day and the Germans actually asked to come and pay their respects for having killed so noble a man.
- [90:21]
Robbie
And so, like, you're feeling emotional about it.
- [90:28]
Paul Hubbard
It's hard not to. You know, it's the. It's. It's a. I'll. I'll. It's hard to. To express how you can feel something like that for someone not related to you and so far in the past. But, you know, you feel it in a way because this was a life ended far too early, but exactly as he might have wished, as horrific as it was.
- [90:49]
Robbie
Is that place still there today?
- [90:52]
Paul Hubbard
Yes, you. I have. It is on. Number one on my bucket list, is to go to the place it's quite easy to find on the map because where he is buried is a national park named after him, which is the Sulu Game Reserve. I believe they've just changed its name quite recently to the Nyerere. I think it's Nyerere. Salou Game Reserve is the new designation for it. But, you know, he's buried not far from when he died, and he's buried with the other six Fusiliers who were killed in action there at the time. But today only Salou's grave is left there in the middle of the mark because it was his wish. They wanted to take his body back to Britain. And the men, and also his own family objected to that, saying that where he should lie is beneath the elephant's feet, which of course is true today. And, you know, the Salou Game Reserve is of course, a world Heritage site now with massive protections around it. And his grave today is just marked. It's a simple stone with a flat bronze plaque with his name and his date of birth and date of death and all the rest from photos. I've never been there because you can still see a huge amount of the trenches from photographs and speaking to people who've been there and inspired me to want to visit there personally. You know, it's the most incredible thing and I cannot wait to get there again. It's when life calms down a bit. That's my first major
- [92:30]
Robbie
Go ahead.
- [92:31]
Paul Hubbard
No, no, no, I was just going to say I just wanted to. I'd written something here to sum him up, and then I want to let Judy Roosevelt have the last word on Salu, if you don't mind. Sum it up because I sent you a page yesterday that I want to quote from.
- [92:44]
Robbie
Yeah, go ahead.
- [92:44]
Paul Hubbard
You know, but in my own words to start off with, you know, is that, you know, Salu today, he's remembered as a. In tales of war, exploration and big game hunting. And, you know, he's remembered as one of the balanced blends of a gentleman, an officer, but he was also an epic wild man. I think that that's something overlooked a lot of the time with Salou is that that man, the bush, wherever it was, was in his heart and his soul, and that is a treasure. I know many people like that. And it's just the most remarkable thing. And something that I always think is unfair today, if you do just a simple Internet search, is he's always labeled as a killer of game, which is completely unfair and wrong. You know, he, he was a hunter, he was a conservationist, he was a soldier, he was a husband, he was a father. And he made a huge contribution to the sum of human knowledge, in my opinion. And part of that sum of knowledge involved the gathering and killing of animals of all kinds, which is a necessary part of such a procedure so that we can understand them in order to better look after them. And not to say that he never took pleasure in it and the thrill of the chase was very much embedded in him, but he exemplified many of the ethics and behaviors that we see as absolutely necessary today. And what sets him apart as well, in my opinion, as a broad summary of his life, is also that, like I said, barely a handful of people I'm aware of ever disliked him, at least publicly and actively. And on top of that, his. Everyone who came into contact with him had something positive to say about how he treated them. He had respect for everyone, no matter your station in life, from the meanest tracker and wagon drivers all the way through to presidents, queens and kings, he treated them all with the same amount of respect and deference and appreciation and took something away and I'm sure left them something quite incredible. And most significantly, I guess for us in the modern world today was his ability to leave the most mesmerizing tales print. You know, it's. It's one of the reasons why he has such a legacy. He was a great writer, a great storyteller, and a great man.
- [94:54]
Robbie
Yeah, I Imagine he wasn't a writer.
- [94:57]
Paul Hubbard
Yeah, I don't know what we'd be talking about.
- [94:59]
Robbie
Salu would not be Salu today.
- [95:01]
Paul Hubbard
Yeah. And you know, you think of all the other things, people that he inspired, people whose. Whose contributions have rippled on. I know so many professional hunters and guides in Zimbabwe who have made that their life, their career because of reading Salus writings, you know, and you know, one of the greatest among them is Dean Kendall, who's one of the best hunters I've ever met in my life, you know, and he knows more about Salu than I do because of how much of an effect his life and writings had on him. Dean is, you know, one of the greatest ever in this country, in my opinion. And you know, the one thing I love is I've sort of got it memorized. So those who might check don't hold me completely accountable. But the last line of his first book, okay, which is, you know, he says, my work is now over. And should my pages have afforded any amusement or instruction to any roving spirit whose inclinations bind him to bend his steps towards the splendid, splendid hunting grounds of Africa, I shall feel amply compensated.
- [96:12]
Robbie
Amazing. Absolutely amazing. Well, we'll end it on that note, Paul.
- [96:17]
Paul Hubbard
Two parts. Gotta let TD have the last word. We gotta let TD have the last word.
- [96:21]
Robbie
Come on, go on.
- [96:22]
Paul Hubbard
I'll just. Hold on, hold on, because I've got to show you. Well, we gotta show everyone on the things here. And I did print it, so in his own writings, there's the last page of the obituary written by Teddy Roosevelt. You can see there's.
- [96:35]
Robbie
This is Salus obituary.
- [96:37]
Paul Hubbard
This is an obituary by Salou which is later published. I can send you all this as well. The publisher, same year in the magazine, an obituary written by Teddy and published in the journal called the Outlook. And I can send you this page as well because it's type out, it's a lot easier to read. You know, there's. There's this thing about handwriting. I can see why he typewrite a lot of his correspondence. But you know, his last lines here are just. They touch me deeply. So he's. When Roosevelt writes this, the day he gets the news of Salus death. So it's raw and it comes through, you know, so to quote Teddy from now until I stop talking, he says about Salu. He led a singularly adventurous and fascinating life with just the right alternations between the wilderness and civilization. He helped spread the borders of his people's land. He added much to the sum of human knowledge. And interest. He closed his life exactly as such a life ought to be closed. By dying in battle for his country while rendering her valiant and effective service. Who could wish for a better life or a better death? Or desire to leave a more honorable heritage to his family and his nation?
- [97:58]
Robbie
Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Hubbard, you are a treasure, my man. You are a treasure beyond words.
- [98:05]
Paul Hubbard
Your.
- [98:06]
Robbie
Your depth of knowledge is unsurpassed, my man. And I look forward to more and more and more discussions on whoever comes next after Salu. I love. I just love that intersection. I had no idea about the intersection between Salou and Teddy and the possible influence of Salou on the greatest conservation achievement in North America, which is the designation of those 250 million acres of public land that makes the public land system so what it is today for me and my kids. So thank you, my friend. I can't wait to do it again.
- [98:44]
Paul Hubbard
Thank you, Robbie. Appreciate it. And yeah, you take care. If anyone wants to. Just as one last thing, it's got nothing to do with me, but the best available biography of Frederick Courtney Salue, in my opinion, is this one here by Norman Etherington called Big Game Hunter. This is. The other biographies that have been done on him are really old and difficult to find, but this one came out just a couple of years ago. In fact, 20 years ago. Sorry, but this is the best of the new ones. And of course, buy his books and read them. That's my advice. You want to appreciate Salu like we do? Please. There's so many additions, so many things available, you know, you'll get a sense of the man that we love to chat about.
- [99:26]
Robbie
Brilliant. Thank you, Paul.
- [99:29]
Paul Hubbard
Cheers.
- [99:31]
Robbie
Well, that's it for today. I appreciate you listening, as always. Leave a review, share it with your friends, and most importantly, do what's right to convey the truth around hunting.