1 64 HUNTING TRIPS 



ourselves comfortably in camp under the 

 shadow of the old stockade fort by the 

 river, was a matter of but a few hours. 

 There we waited for the afternoon shadows 

 to lengthen and the evening to come, when 

 off we went up the stream for five or six 

 miles to a spot where some mighty forest 

 monarchs with huge, bare, spreading limbs 

 had caught the eye of one of our sporting 

 scouts in the afternoon. Leaving our 

 horses half a mile from the place, we walked 

 silently along the river bank through the 

 jungle to the roosting trees, where we scat- 

 tered, and each man secreted himself as best 

 he could in the underbrush, or in a hollow 

 stump, or in the reeds of the river itself. 

 The sun was setting, and over the hills and 

 from the lowlands came the echoes of the 

 familiar gobble, gobble, gobble, as each 

 strutting, foolishly proud cock headed his 

 admiring family for the roost, after their 

 day's feeding on the uplands. Soon, as I 

 lay close and hushed in my hiding-place, 

 sounds like the clinking of silver, followed 



