CHAPTER IV 
HUNTING THE AFRICAN BUFFALO 
: HE buffalo is different from any other kind 
of animalin Africa. A lion prefers not to fight 
aman. Healmost never attacks unprovoked, 
and even when he does attack he is not vindictive. 
The elephant, like the lion, prefers to be left alone. 
But he is quicker to attack than the lion and he isn’t 
satisfied merely to knock out his man enemy. Com- 
plete destruction is his aim. The buffalo is even 
quicker than the elephant to take offence at man and 
he is as keen-sighted, clever, and vindictive as the 
elephant. As a matter of fact, the domesticated bull 
is more likely to attack man without provocation 
than any wild animal I know, and those who wan- 
dered on foot around the bulls on our Western prairies 
in the old cattle days probably experienced the same 
kind of charges one gets from African buffaloes. 
Nevertheless, despite all these qualities, which are 
almost universally attributed to the African buffalo, 
I am confident that the buffalo, like the elephant and 
other wild animals, has no instinctive enmity to man. 
That enmity, I am sure, is acquired by experience. 
I had an experience on the Aberdare Plateau with a 
band of elephants that had seen little or nothing of 
man, and until they learned about men from me they 
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