112 HIPPO AND LEOPARD [ch. v 



by a shot through the neck. The porters were much 

 wrought up about the snake, and did not at all like my 

 touching it and taking it up, first by the tail and then 

 by the head. It was only twelve feet long. We tied 

 it to a long stick and sent it in by two porters. 



Another day we beat for lions, but without success. 

 We rode to a spot a few miles off, where we were joined 

 by three Boer fiu-mers. They were big, upstanding 

 men, looking just as Boer farmers ought to look who 

 had been through a war and had ever since led the 

 adventurous life of frontier farmers in wild regions. 

 They were accompanied by a pack of big, rough-looking 

 dogs, but were on foot, walking with long and easy 

 strides. The dogs looked a rough-and-ready lot, but 

 on this particular morning showed themselves of little 

 use ; at any rate, they put up nothing. 



But Kermit had a bit of deserved good luck. While 

 the main body of us went down the river-bed, he and 

 McMillan, with a few natives, beat up a side ravine, 

 down the middle of which ran the usual dry water- 

 course fringed with patches of brush. In one of these 

 they put up a leopard, and saw it shnking forward 

 ahead of them through the bushes, 'ilien they lost 

 sight of it, and came to the conclusion that it was in a 

 large thicket. So Kermit went on one side of it and 

 McMillan on the other, and the beaters approached 

 to try and get the leopard out. Of course, none of the 

 beaters had guns ; their function was merely to make a 

 disturbance and rouse the game, and they were cautioned 

 on no account to get into danger. But the leopard did 

 not wait to be driven. Without any warning, out he 

 came and charged straight at Kermit, who stopped him 

 when he was but six yards off with a bullet in the fore 

 part of the body ; the leopard turned, and as he galloped 



