Big Game SRooting 



toss here evidently," said my companion; "loss 

 of blood, I suppose." 



He had kept on through this dense mass 

 of matted vegetation in an extraordinary way, 

 however, and we had covered some distance, but 

 without proceeding at any pace to speak of, for 

 fear of starting him off if he should be lying 

 down. The tracks were now beginning to get 

 mixed up with others, and I was afraid of losing 

 him, so motioned one of the gun-bearers, a first- 

 rate tracker, to go in front. After another fifty 

 yards he suddenly stopped and stiffened, which 

 somewhat surprised me, as if he had seen the 

 wounded animal he ought not to have assumed 

 the exact attitude he did. This was explained 

 a moment after, as with a roar a lion bounded 

 into the reeds and made off, grunting with annoy- 

 ance. He had evidently been messing about 

 within the fringe of reeds when the wounded 

 water-buck, whose carcase lay on the ground, had 

 stumbled into him, and had been instantly killed. 

 He was, I suppose, hungry, so our inopportune 

 appearance on the scene of action angered him. 



Anyhow, there lay the water-buck a real 

 beauty, with a splendid head well over thirty 

 inches, and the horns curving outwards so much 

 as to be almost straight, their tips forming nearly 

 an equilateral triangle with their length. How- 

 ever, there was no time then for congratulation, 

 as the lion had to be followed "at once if not 



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