52 ON THE FEONTIEE. 



knee and hock to hock, and you have eight right angles on 

 your centre cut. Catch hold of the skin at any angle you 

 like with your left hand, and using your knife in your right 

 to loosen the skin from the flesh, skin away. Quite easy, 

 you see. 



I went to work with confidence, but soon found that if I 

 had not an elephant on my hands I had the next thing to 

 one. I could not lay a buffalo-bull on the flat of his back 

 as I could a specimen dormouse ; and if I could, his hump 

 would not let him stop in such a position. That was why he 

 had fallen back on his side after dying with his legs in the 

 air. But what could be easier than to skin the side of the 

 buffalo lying uppermost down to the ground, turn him over 

 and finish the other side ? 



With many sharpenings and re-sharpenings of my 

 hunting-knife for the old bull had a tough overcoat of 

 his own that much was accomplished, and I rolled the 

 half skin neatly up past the backbone, so that it would be 

 free from the buffalo's weight when he should be turned 

 over, and then sat down on the carcass to take a comfort- 

 able rest, for my back had begun to ache with stooping. 



I now looked round me with feelings of satisfaction. 

 I was getting on famously. I got up and attempted to 

 turn the bull over. Turn him over ! Why, I might as well 

 have tried to lift myself off the ground by pulling at my 

 moccasin strings. I pushed, I pulled ; tried one leg, tried 

 another. I perspired and I strained. I sat down and felt 

 very small indeed. If I only had a horse, it would be 

 quite simple. The loop of a "lariat" thrown over the 

 bull's legs, a few turns of its slack round the horn of my 



