HUNTING THE ORYX. 205 



quills, I succeeded in killing him with the jambok, but not till I 

 had received several wounds in my hands. My boys the while 

 sat grinning in their saddles, enjoying the activity of their " baas." 



Having cohered him with bushes, we rode on, and shortly came 

 jpon an immense, compact herd of several thousand migrating 

 springboks, which were exceedingly tame, and in the middle of 

 them stood two oryx. These we managed for the first time to 

 drive in a southerly direction, being that in which the camp lay ; 

 and, after a sharp and rather circular burst, I headed the finer and 

 bowled her over. She proved to be a young cow about three 

 years old. Having disemboweled her, and prepared her for the 

 pack-saddle with a couteau-de-chasse, by splitting the brisket, 

 passing the knife along the gristly bones on one side of it, and 

 breaking the back by a dexterous touch of the knife, where cer- 

 tain ribs well known to the hunter join the vertebrae, whereby the 

 animal can more easily be balanced on the pack-saddle, we suc- 

 ceeded with great difficulty in placing her on " Sunday," and 

 rode slowly for the place where we had left the porcupine. We 

 placed him on the oryx, and secured him with a rheim, but we 

 had not proceeded far when some of the quills pricked the steed, 

 upon which he commenced bucking and prancing in the most 

 frantic manner, which of coarse made matters ten times worse, 

 causing the porcupine to beat the devil's tattoo on his back. The 

 gemsbok's head, also, which, being a poor one, I had not cut off 

 unfortunately got adrifi, and kept dangling about his haunches, 

 the sharp horns striking his belly at every spring. He broke 

 loose from Jacob, who led him, and set off across the country at a 

 terrific pace, eventually smashing the pack-saddle, but still failing 

 to disengage himself from the gemsbok, whose hind and fore feet, 

 being fastened together, slipped round under his belly, impeding 

 his motions, and in this condition he was eventually secured, 

 being considerably lacerated about the haunches by the horns of 

 the oryx. 



Next day Cobus and I fell in with the finest bull oryx I had yet 

 met, which, after a severe chase, we rode into and slew. 01 

 some evenings previous a large bright comet had appeared in the 



