XVI 



TOPI 



DAMALISCUS GIMELA 



I HAVE just killed a topi in the Nimule 

 district ; so now I am at a greater loss 

 than ever to decide where the line comes 

 that separates topi from tiang. 

 My victim is a topi right enough. His head 

 shows this, as do his colour, make, and shape, to 

 say nothing of the two attendant females. I was 

 sure they were topi when I first set eyes upon 

 them, and I made doubly sure by again scru- 

 tinizing them for some time through glasses 

 before I fired. They had no idea of my presence, 

 and my orderlies sat down at once. I was then 

 enabled to have a good look at them sixty yards 

 away for some ten minutes, so that there was no 

 possibility of my mistaking them. 



They wore the same dark red and purple clothes 

 in which I had previously made their acquaintance 

 in East Africa and on the German boundary. 

 The horns of the individual I have shot are 

 very thick indeed, being in fact much thicker 

 than I had expected to find them, but not so long 

 as in my former specimen, shot five hundred miles 



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