308 AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 



within fifty yards of the rhino, and, with my rifle ready, 

 began shouting, trying to keep the just mean as regards 

 noise, so as to scare him, and yet not yell so loudly as to 

 reach the buffalo if they happened to be near by. At last 

 I succeeded, and he trotted sullenly off, tacking and veer- 

 ing, and not going far. On we went, and in another half- 

 hour came on our quarry. I was the first to catch a glimpse 

 of the line of bulky black forms, picked out with white where 

 the sun glinted on the horn bosses. It was ten o'clock, a 

 hot, windless morning on the equator, with the sun shin- 

 ing from a cloudless sky; yet these buffalo were feeding in 

 the open, miles from water or dense cover. They were 

 greedily cropping the few tufts of coarse herbage that grew 

 among the sparse thorn-bushes, which here were not more 

 than two feet high. In many places buffalo are purely 

 nocturnal feeders, and do not come into the hot, bare plains 

 in the scorching glare of daylight; and our experience with 

 this herd illustrates afresh the need of caution in generaliz- 

 ing about the habits of game. 



We crept toward them on all-fours, having left the por- 

 ters hidden from sight. At last we were within rather long 

 range a buffalo's eyesight is good, and cannot be trifled 

 with as if he were a rhino or elephant and cautiously 

 scrutinized the herd through our glasses. There were only 

 cows and perhaps one or two young bulls with horns no 

 bigger than those of cows. I would have liked another good 

 bull's head for myself; but I also wished another cow for 

 the museum. Before I could shoot, however, a loud yelling 

 was heard from among the porters in our rear; and away 

 went the buffalo. Full of wrath, we walked back to in- 

 quire. We found that one porter had lost his knife, and 



