Buffalo Shoot 



orderly had gone up the tree like a streak of 

 lightning, taking with him the spare rifle. For a 

 brief second I really thought I was caught in a trap. 

 I made a leap for the tree, but it was a difficult one, 

 and I missed my grip. The orderly in his excite- 

 ment failed to render me assistance. It was not till 

 a third jump that I succeeded in getting up; it 

 seemed ages to me, but it could only have been a 

 couple of seconds. 



The whole herd had by now galloped up to 

 within ten yards of our refuge. There they halted 

 — uncomfortably close to my tree, which was only 

 a sapling fifteen feet in height — with their noses 

 in the air, trying to ascertain my whereabouts and 

 puzzled at my sudden disappearance. I knew if 

 one of them, finding out where I was, charged my 

 tree, I would fall like a ripe peach into their very 

 midst. I snatched the orderly's rifle from him, as he 

 was very reluctant to let me have it, and fired into 

 the mass. Firing from the branch of a tree after 

 a severe fright is somewhat haphazard work. The 

 result was that I hit a young bull instead of an old 

 one, but I had succeeded in alarming them, and 

 charging in another direction they swerved off up a 

 hill. Behind them all came the splendid old cape 

 bull whom I had originally hit. I let him have 

 another, and he went about a hundred yards and 

 fell headlong. I then jumped down and went in 

 pursuit, but the native hunters were very slow to 

 move, and I had to shout to them to get them to 

 go forward at all. They seemed stupefied by their 



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