212 MY SOMALT BOOK 



rake the herds of hartebeest with shrapnel ! Or can 

 it be that our critic has perchance confused a magazine 

 rifle with a maxim gun ? 



I have referred to the diminution of big game in 

 different countries. In Northern Somaliland, lions, 

 which have always been much sought for, have certainly 

 been reduced in numbers. Elephants, too, are now 

 rare, not having been killed off so much as driven away 

 into Abyssinia. Otherwise, so far as I have been able 

 to gather, there has not been any very appreciable 

 reduction in the game generally, except near the 

 coast where the herds of ao2tl have been driven inland, 

 and in Ogo-Guban round Hargeisa. And there are, 

 perhaps, fewer kudu than there used to be. But that 

 Somaliland has been, as sometimes stated, " shot out," 

 is absolutely not a fact. 



Considerable numbers of animals are, however, 

 killed by the Somalis and their hides and horns ex- 

 ported. This export has been forbidden from the 

 British ports, but I have frequently, in Aden, seen 

 bales of hides and horns that had come from the 

 Italian ports, while with the increase in the number 

 of rifles in the country the effect on the game is 

 bound in time to be considerable. I remember a 

 French merchant in Aden telling me of a consign- 

 ment of " rabbit " skins he had received from Somali- 

 land. I asked him to let me see one. It was a 

 dik-dik's ! 



If this has been a rambling chapter you must 

 blame my pen. A fountain-pen, tied to no ink-pot, 

 acquires independence of character, and when it is, 



