404 AFRICAN CAMP FIRES. 



fish with the fly in the book, but one has at 

 least a chance if one keeps it on the water. 



Mavrouki was the only one among us who had 

 the living faith that comes from having seen the 

 animal in the flesh. That is a curious bit of 

 hunter psychology. When a man is out after 

 a species new to him, it is only by the utmost 

 stretch of the imagination that he is able to 

 realize that such an animal can exist at all. 

 He cannot prefigure it, somehow. He generally 

 exaggerates to himself the difficulty of making it 

 out, of approaching it, of getting his shot ; until 

 at last, if he happens to have hunted some time 

 in vain, the beast becomes almost mythical and 

 unbelievable. Once he has seen the animal, 

 whether he gets a shot or not, all this vanishes. 

 The strain on faith relaxes. He knows what to 

 look for, and what to expect ; and even if he 

 sees no other specimen for a month, he never- 

 theless goes about the business with a certain 

 confidence. 



One afternoon we had been hunting carefully 

 certain low mountains, and were headed for camp, 

 walking rather carelessly along the bed of a nar- 

 row, open valley below the bush-covered side hills. 

 The sun had disappeared behind the ranges, 

 and the dusk of evening was just beginning 



