THE LAST FRONTIER 



case the kill is made, to send back for help. No 

 matter how skilful your men are at stalking, the 

 chances of alarming the game are greatly increased 

 by numbers; while the possibilities of misunder- 

 standing the plan of campaign, and so getting into 

 the wrong place at the wrong time, are infinite. 

 Alone, or with one gunbearer, a man can slip in and 

 out a herd of formidable animals with the least 

 chances of danger. Merely going out after camp 

 meat is of course a different matter. 



We did not follow in the direction taken by the 

 herd the night before, but struck off toward the 

 opposite side of the valley. For two hours we 

 searched the wooded country at the base of the cliff 

 mountains, working slowly around the circle, examin- 

 ing every inlet, ravine and gully. Plenty of other 

 sorts of game we saw, including elephant tracks not 

 a half hour old ; but no buffalo. About eight o'clock, 

 however, while looking through my glasses, I caught 

 sight of some tiny chunky black dots crawling along 

 below the mountains diagonally across the valley, 

 and somewhat over three miles away. We started 

 in that direction as fast as we could walk. At the 

 end of an hour we surmounted the last swell, and 

 stood at the edge of a steep drop. Immediately 

 below us flowed a good-sized stream through a high 

 jungle over the tops of which we looked to a tri- 



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