GREAT BATTUE OF ANTELOPES. 65 



" Often," says the late Sir Samuel Baker," have I pitied 

 Gordon Gumming, when I have heard him talked of as a 

 palpable Munchausen, by men who never fired a rifle, or 

 saw a wild beast, except in a cage ; and still these men form 

 the greater proportion of the 'readers' of these works." 

 "Men who have not seen, cannot understand the grandeur 

 of wild sports in a wild country." * 



Sir Samuel Baker speaks feelingly on this subject, 

 and remarks, that this species of unfair criticism, 

 " is one great drawback to the publication of sporting adven- 

 tures," for "they always appear to deal not a little in the 

 marvellous; and this effect is generally heightened by the 

 use of the first person, in writing" "It is this feeling (he 

 says) that deters many men who have passed through years 

 of wild sports, from publishing an account of them." f 



We may here observe that so lately as August 24, 

 1860, during the visit of one of our Royal Princes to 

 South Africa, according to Dr. Schweinfurth, the Boers, 

 assisted by a whole clan of Kaffirs got up a battue 

 in honour of his arrival in their country, and between 

 20,000 and 30,000 antelopes are said to have been 

 enclosed. This shows the vast quantities of game 

 still existing in quite modern times. 



Sir Samuel Baker himself gives the following 

 account of game seen in one of the noble open forests 

 in the vicinity of the Yalle River, Ceylon: 



" I never saw game in such masses as had now collected 

 in this neighbourhood/' "There was too much game. Dur- 

 ing the whole day's walk I was certainly not five minutes 

 without seeing either elk, deer, buffalo, or hog. The noise of 



* The Rifle and Hound in Ceylon, by Sir Samuel W. Baker, 

 Edition of 1874, Chapter i, p. 5. 

 f Ibid., p. 4. 

 See Schweinfurth's Heart of Africa, 1874, Vol. i., p. 358. 



VOL. III. .S 



