Sport in East Africa. 319 



wrath by swearing at us in their own discordant 

 language ! 



Early next morning we commenced the ascent of 

 the range. The shikarie would not take us to the 

 part occupied by missionaries, who had a station 

 there, but crossing many miles lower down, he took 

 us to a deserted village with large pools of water, 

 where it was said hippopotami, and even giraffes 

 were at times to be found. 



Hippoos require a good deal of food, and they 

 soon devour the stock of aquatic plants in a cir- 

 cumscribed sheet of water, they then migrate else- 

 where and only return when the pool has become 

 stocked again. So a visitor to a locality may on 

 certain occasions find behemoth and at others not ; 

 These hippoos bore a bad name, and were said to care 

 nothing for anybody, and now and then took the 

 initiative in attacking. This view of their character 

 was borne out by the guide, who declared his brother 

 had been killed by one of these river horses at one of 

 these very pools. He said there were no trees near 

 and but a fringe of grass round the edge of the vley. 



On the plateau we saw a great many florikan and 

 deer, but got none. I shot a few partridges, as they 

 lay well and allowed one to almost walk over them 

 before rising, so afforded easy shots ; but for the 

 table they were scarcely worth powder and shot. 

 By 3 P.M. we began the descent of the range, to the 

 west, but going down was almost worse than climbing 

 up, and it was dark when we got to the plain beyond, 

 and finding a cleared spot, pitched our camp and 

 made ourselves comfortable for the night. But 

 during sunset and sunrise a lion prowled round us, 



