HUNTING THE AFRICAN BUFFALO 85 
as I supposed, at the one I had located. As I fired, 
the animals bolted, first away, then back toward me. 
They wheeled, ran halfway between the dead animal 
and me, and passing on about a hundred yards to the 
right wheeled about again and stood watching me, 
the bulls in the front, lined up like soldiers, the calves 
and cows in the background. On coming up to the 
dead animal, I found, much to my regret, that I had 
shot a cow and not the bull I had picked out through 
the glasses. 
I returned to camp feeling that now at last, from 
this herd living apparently in the open, we should 
have relatively little difficulty in completing our 
series of specimens. On the following morning, much 
to our disappointment, our first glimpse of the herd 
was just as it disappeared in the thorn bush along 
the bank of the river. We put in nearly a week of 
hard work to complete the series, 
During those seven days of continual hunting, that 
herd which had been indifferent and unsuspecting at 
the beginning, like the elephants, became cautious, 
vigilant, and aggressive. For instance, on one oc- 
casion near the close of the week, after having spent 
the day trying to locate the herd, I suddenly came 
face to face with them just at the edge of the bush 
at night on my way back to camp. ‘They were tear- 
ing along at a good pace, apparently having been 
alarmed. I stepped to one side and crouched in 
the low grass while they passed me in a cloud of dust 
at twenty-five or thirty yards. Even had I been 
able to pick out desirable specimens at this time I 
