9O NATURAL HISTORY ESSAYS 



tails in characteristic fashion as they alight. A tiny 

 antelope darts across the clearing to dive headlong 

 into the bush ; a troop of pallah, red-coated and 

 gazelle-eyed, streak through the neighbouring 

 thicket, often leaping high in the air, as if made of 

 indiarubber. Feeding slowly along, the buffaloes 

 begin to pass some of the larger forest trees ; 

 hundreds of the trunks show a smear where some 

 mud-covered elephant has rubbed against them. 

 Here an uprooted mimosa lies bent and broken on 

 the red soil ; there in a tangled mass lie half-chewed 

 stalks of the sanseviera hemp. And now the actual 

 herd of elephants is seen, and the wood seems alive 

 with dark swaying tarpaulin-covered wagons the 

 bodies of the elephants. Passing among the weather- 

 beaten trees, these same trees seem to take life and 

 motion as out into the sunshine, with peacock necks 

 swinging up and down, glides a troop of beautiful 

 giraffe. As the buffaloes progress, through the 

 thinning forest are seen glimpses of a wide plain, its 

 vast expanse dotted with acacia trees and black with 

 game. Far out on the veldt an immense troop of 

 zebras, their striped coats toned down to a dull grey 

 by the distance, pasture in a huge crescent ; hundreds 

 of wildebeest blacken the plains, the old bulls 

 standing solitary on sentry duty ; dim in the distance a 

 troop of hartebeest show as a dull red blur among the 

 anthills. To the naturalist, this zoological gardens 

 let loose is of the greatest interest ; but the buffaloes 



