'^ Buffaloes and Crocodiles 



venison. My caravan was amply provided with Indian 

 rice, which is so easy to carry, and I was just expecting 

 a subsidiary caravan with over loo packets of the same 

 from the coast. There was a famine at the time, and 

 it was an exceedingly clear and almost unattainable article 

 of food. I was sorely tempted to fire at two rhinoceroses, 

 which nearly ran me down at a moment when I was 

 following a honey-pointer. The cheerful cry of the 

 honey-guides {Indicator sparrnniiu\ I. major, and /. 

 minor) one follows whenever possible, to be guided in 

 all probability to a hive. Idie fatigue of the pursuit is- 

 often richly repaid by priceless stores of honey, a delicacy 

 much prized in the lonely wilderness. 



I soon found that the buffaloes made this spot their 

 nightly haunt. A great number of the grass-patches on 

 the island were hot and scorched. Onlv at the fringe of 

 the marsh fresh green grass was sprouting just where the 

 water rippled and made the ground wet and damp and 

 black. The marshy bits between the grass-patches, 

 although still filled with turbid water, were in the act 

 of drying, and were, like the surrounding ground, well 

 trodden by buffaloes. It is diflicult for any one to 

 form any conception of the unhealthy district these 

 animals had chosen as their place of refuge. The water 

 oozed out of the stagnant, swampy ground at every step. 

 A very varied marsh vegetation grew everywhere. Over 

 the desert wastes, or on the edge of the marsh, hundreds 

 of softly twittering pratincoles hopped about {Glarco/a 

 fnsca), and at night the mosquitoes swarmed in myriads. 

 A rich variety of birds was to be found there, but 



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