CH. vn] A TYPICAL AFUK AN SCENE 1C3 



paces. As soon as I had pulled trigger I wheeled to 

 wateh the rhino. It started round at the shot and 

 gazed toward us with its ears cocked forward, but made 

 no mo\'ement to adxanee. \\nnle a couple of porters 

 were dressing the hyena, 1 could not help laughing at 

 finding that we were the centre of a thoroughly African 

 circle of deeply interested spectators. We were in the 

 middle of a vast plain, covered with sun-scorched grass, 

 and here and there a stunted thorn ; in the background 

 were isolated barren hills, and the mirage wavered in 

 the distance. \'ultures wheeled overhead. The rhino, 

 less than half a mile away, stared steadily at us. Wilde- 

 beest—their heavy forequarters and the carriage of 

 their heads making them look like bison— and harte- 

 beest were somewhat nearer, in a ring all round us, 

 intent upon our proceedings. Four topi became so 

 much interested that they approached within two 

 hundred and fifty yards and stood motionless. A buck 

 tommy came even closer, and a zebra trotted by at 

 about the same distance, uttering its queer bark or 

 neigh. It continued its course past the rhino, and 

 started a new train of ideas in the latter's muddled 

 reptilian brain ; round it wheeled, gazed after the zebra, 

 and then evidently concluded that everything was 

 normal, for it lay down to sleep. 



On we went, past a wildebeest herd lying down ; at 

 a distance they looked exactly like bison as they used to 

 I lie out on the prairie in the old days. We halted for 

 an hour and a half to rest the men and horses, and took 

 our lunch under a thick-trunked olive-tree that must 

 , have been a couple of centuries old. Again we went 

 I on, ever scanning through the glasses every distant 

 j object which we thought might possibly be a lion, and 

 ^ ever being disappointed. A serval-cat jumped up 



