viii FOREWORD 



foes before which he himself perishes in his hundreds of 

 thousands. 



The dark-skinned races that live in the land vary 

 widely. Some are warlike, cattle-owning nomads ; 

 some till the soil and live in thatched huts shaped 

 like beehives ; some are fisherfolk ; some are ape-like, 

 naked savages, who dwell in the woods and prey 

 on creatures not much wilder or lower than them- 

 selves. 



The land teems with beasts of the chase, infinite in 

 number and incredible in variety. It holds the fiercest 

 beasts of ravin, and the fleetest and most timid of 

 those things that live in undying fear of talon and 

 fang. It holds the largest and the smallest of hoofed 

 animals. It holds the mightiest creatures that tread 

 the earth or swim in its rivers ; it also holds distant 

 kinsfolk of these same creatures, no bigger than wood- 

 chucks, which dwell in crannies of the rocks, and in the 

 tree-tops. There are antelope smaller than hares, and , 

 antelope larger than oxen. There are creatures which 

 are the embodiments of grace ; and others whose huge 

 ungainliness is like that of a shape in a nightmare. 

 The plains are alive with droves of strange and beautiful 

 animals whose like is not known elsewhere ; and with 

 others, even stranger, that show both in form and temper 

 something of the fantastic and the grotesque. It is a 

 never-ending pleasure to gaze at the great herds of 

 buck as they move to and fro in their myriads ; as they 

 stand for their noontide rest in the quivering heat haze ; 

 as the long files come down to drink at the watering- 

 places ; as they feed and fight and rest and make love. 



I'he hunter who wanders through these lands sees 

 sights which ever afterward remain fixed in his mind. 

 H e sees the monstrous river-horse snorting and plunguig 



