8 THK GAME OF BRITISH EAST AFRICA. 



Some people may be astonished that rhino do not come under my heading of 

 sporting animals to shoot. That he is an exceedingly dangerous animal in thick 

 bush I am quite ready to testify. In such a country as North-Eastern Rhodesia he 

 is a most exciting and interesting animal to hunt. In East Africa, however, people 

 do not, as a rule, go into bush to look for him. 



In many places in this country, directly one gets off the beaten track, rhino are 

 common and in many localities swarming. On the plains or in a park-like country 

 of thorn trees and short grass he is so easy to locate and approach that there is no 

 such thing as hunting and stalking him. On a licence two are allowed, and by 

 choosing a favourable moment these two can always be shot with much more ease 

 than could two hartebeest under similar circumstances. Add to this a little caution 

 and he can be shot with little more danger than the latter animal. Having shot 

 your two, if you go rummaging about in thick bush the chances are that you will 

 have to shoot a third and fourth at considerably more personal risk, and, moreover, 

 you will have to hand in the trophies to the Government. 



So much for one's point of view as a sportsman, and apologies for being 

 a hunter. After this I hope to bore the reader as little as possible with the actual 

 slaying of animals, my intention being to try and describe the game, and game 

 countries as they appear to the naturalist and sportsman. I do not pretend to be 

 a scientific naturalist, but only a rough-and-ready field naturalist recording his 

 obsen-ations. As regards such observations, it will have been noticed that different 

 writers' accounts of the game inhabiting a certain country are often singularly at 

 variance. A discussion on the habits of the tsetse fly which recently took place 

 in the columns of the Field will serve as an instance in point as to the different 

 views people take of the habits of the same creature. 



The reason for such divergence of observation is sometimes hard to discover. 

 Some men are more imaginative than others and unconsciously fill in a lot of detail 

 from some small observation actually made. As it is impossible to observe game 

 as closely as one might some domestic animal, most observations of game in their 

 wild state must be supplemented to a certain extent by deductions drawn from 

 spoor, sound, or inference. 



Other men are apt to jump at conclusions and stick to them whether they are 

 proved wrong or not by subsequent experience. 



Others are liable to generalise too much from some one or two incidents observed. 

 I have often heard men lay down infallible rules as to the conduct of certain 

 animals, when to my own knowledge they have only seen the animals in question 

 once or twice. 



