HORNS 



the day, especially if they have been disturbed by the 

 passing of natives with their cattle, they retire to the 

 depths of the bush, where it is almost impossible to 

 see them, so close do they lie. I have often crept 

 along, following their trail as quietly and silently as 

 possible, only to find the place empty where they had 

 been resting, and whence they had fled in alarm at 

 my approach. Big as they are, they yet make their 

 escape without noise, seeming almost to melt away in 

 the bush. On one occasion only have I been able to 

 creep close up to them in the middle of the day. It 

 took me over three hours of most careful stalking, at 

 times bent almost double as I made my way through 

 the thickets, at others crawling on hands and knees, 

 only to find that there was no head worth shooting, 

 when I finally caught sight of them. Few people, 

 who have not themselves hunted in the shadeless 

 scrub of an East African desert right on the Equator, 

 can appreciate the difficulties and the fatigue that 

 have to be endured for days, and often for weeks, 

 before success brings its reward. 



On this occasion, however, I was more than repaid 

 by the delight it gave me to watch these beautiful 

 antelopes at close quarters ; they were quite unaware 

 of my presence, without any suspicion of the close 

 proximity of danger. Of the eleven arrola there, 

 two were young bulls which had not yet attained 

 their full growth, for the slender points of their horns 

 were turned inwards. It is interesting to note that 

 this sign of immaturity is also found in the impalla, 

 and is due to the rotation of the horny sheath on the 

 bony axis during growth ; but in the considerable 

 number of female arrola that I saw, the inward in- 

 clination of the tips in the young was never so 



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