ABSTRACT
Travellers were well aware that they were expected to record their observations irrespective of the reasons and motivations for their expeditions in central Africa. Indeed, it was felt by several explorers that their duties had radically increased within a short period of time. This sentiment can be noted in the preface to Charles John Andersson’s Okavango River (1861):
He [an explorer] is now expected to be competently versed in many sciences, and in much knowledge out of the beat of ordinary accomplishment. He is supposed to understand meteorology, hygrometry, and hydrogeny; to collect geological specimens, to gather political and commercial information, to advance the infant study of ethnology, to sketch, to write a copious journal, to shoot and stuff birds and beasts, to collect grammars and vocabularies, and frequently to forward long reports to the R.G.S.1
