Untrodden Paths 25 



tabulate it. Wintgens and I, on the other hand, made a little 

 dash forward into the unexplored region to the eastward in the 

 direction of the Kagera, accompanied by very few carriers and 

 with provisions for one day. It is not possible with the pen 

 adequately to describe the wonderful sensation of joy and victory 

 that stirs the soul of the explorer as he roves along virgin tracks 

 never trodden before by European foot. Involuntarily his 

 thoughts fly wandering back, with a feeling of admiration, to 

 those early pioneers of European civilisation, who v/ith undaunted 

 bravery and without those comforts which nowadays tend to 

 alleviate the hardships of travel, spent years in exploring the 

 dark paths of strange countries and facing unknown perils. A 

 glow of reflected splendour seemed to illuminate our path. 



It was dark when we left the camp, but before very long the 

 light of day appeared in the east. The steppe, sparsely covered 

 with acacia shrub, spread out before us in hilly chains. From 

 summit to summit we progressed, scouring all the country around 

 and below us with our glasses. Solitude encircled us. To the 

 east the bush dwindled away to treeless buga* on which roamed 

 numberless herds of every kind of game. In the light of the 

 dawn the striped skin of the zebra and the bulky yellow body of 

 the eland rose up in striking contrast to the dark waste spaces. 

 We saw various kinds of bustard, and ever and anon some great 

 denizen of the air would soar heavenward in majestic flight. 



From a mountain top we finally espied a stream rushing 

 along the yellow steppe in its sap-green, red grass setting, and 

 discovered it to be the small river known as the Kalangassa by 

 the natives, which drains into the Kagera and discharges south 

 of Kanjonsa. Its banks were crowded with tremendous herds of 

 game — zebras intermingled with lyre-antelopes, reed-buck and 

 duykerbok of every kind. I thought I would take a snapshot of 

 the zebras, and galloped after a troop, already in flight, leaving 

 my boy a long way behind with my rifle. Suddenly I heard 

 successive shots fired behind me in the distance. As I had an 

 understanding with Wintgens that no ordinary game but buffaloes 



* Buga, open steppe. 



