Hunting in Many Lands 



where he stood watching us, his bushy tail 

 stretched out as stifif as iron behind him, paw- 

 ing the ground, and thus we left him. 



Shooting wild asses was much tamer busi- 

 ness. We saw them sometimes in herds of 

 five or six hundred. They would mix with our 

 mules even when grazing around the camp, and 

 often took them off five or six miles, when we 

 had great difficulty in getting them back. We 

 frequently, however, killed one for meat, which 

 we found to be very savory; though most of 

 my men, who were Mahomedans, would only 

 eat it when very hard pushed by hunger, as 

 their religion forbade them to eat the flesh of 

 any animal without cloven hoofs. I always 

 felt, however, in shooting these animals, as if 

 I were destroying a domestic mule, and could 

 never bring myself to look upon them as fit 

 game for a sportsman. This was strongly im- 

 pressed upon me one day when, desiring to 

 get a fine specimen, whose skin and bones I 

 could bring back for the National Museum, I 

 shot a very large jack which was grazing some 

 distance from our line of march, and broke its 

 hind legs, and was then obliged to go up to 

 the poor beast and put a ball into its head. 

 After accomplishing this disagreeable duty in 



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