128 THE LAND OF THE LION 
there is space between the bushy clumps to see what you 
shot at, a charging buffalo with lowered head, should be 
easy to stop. The great broad shoulders and neck offering 
a mark which is almost impossible to miss. Such a country 
is that round the upper waters of the Guasi Nyiro end of 
the north, and usually these animals are very plentiful here. 
Thickets near the water side, or on mountain land, 
are a totally different matter. No one who has not tried 
to force a way through African cover, can have any idea 
of its holding qualities. Legs, arms, rifle, hat, may be 
tied down, dragged back, plucked over your eyes, all at 
the same moment. For long distances you must crawl 
through dark, leafy, prickly, tunnels, where you can see 
nothing ahead of you. So handicapped, the best shot in 
the world has a poor chance for his life, with the rhino or 
buffalo. 
The rhino blunders on top of you. The buffalo lays 
in wait for you, cunningly chooses his position near his 
own retreating spoor, but to one side. He has doubled 
back on his course to do so. And when he sees you, and 
you cannot see him, charges home, nothing but death stop- 
ping his rush. 
I have known of a good man killed in the evening by 
a buffalo he had wounded in the morning, and whose spoor 
he had for many hours abandoned. He was coming back 
to camp through the same country he hunted in the morning. 
As he did so he unfortunately chanced to pass close to the 
spot where all day long, the wounded beast had awaited 
his enemy. He was killed almost instantly. 
I was, as I think now, foolish enough in just such a 
covert, to follow the first buffalo I had wounded, for four 
hours. There, several times, he doubled on his track, and 
stood waiting till] came up and passed him by. It was quite 
impossible to see him. His heart must have failed 
him at the last moment, for all the sign I had of him was 
ee a ee ee 
