about, neglected and forgotten, round the outspans, 

 the tents of lone prospectors, the cabins of the diggers, 

 and the grass wayside shanties of the traders. How 

 many a ' record ' head must have gone then, when 

 none had thought of time or means to save them ! 

 Horns and skins lay in jumbled heaps in the yards or 

 sheds of the big trading stores. The splendid horns 

 of the Koodoo and Sable, and a score of others only 

 less beautiful, could be seen nailed up in crude 

 adornment of the roughest walls ; nailed up, and 

 then unnoticed and forgotten ! And yet not quite ! 

 For although to the older hands they were of no 

 further interest, to the newcomer they spoke of 

 something yet to see, and something to be done ; 

 and the sight set him dreaming of the time when he 

 too would go a-hunting and bring his trophies home. 



Perched on the edge of the Berg, we overlooked the 

 wonder-world of the Bushveld, where the big game 

 roamed in thousands and the " wildest tales were true." 

 Living on the fringe of a hunter's paradise, most of 

 us were drawn into it from time to time, for shorter 

 or longer spells, as opportunity and our circumstances 

 allowed ; and little by little one got to know the 

 names, appearances, and habits of the many kinds of 

 game below. Long talks in the quiet nights up there 

 under waggons, in grass shelters in the woods, or in 

 the wattle-and-daub shanties of the diggers, where 

 men passed to and fro and swapped lies, as the 

 polite phrase went, were our ' night's entertainments,' 

 when younger hands might learn much that was useful 

 and true, and more that was neither. 



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