CHAP. in. ELAND. 177 



his body an extra foot from the ground, I turned to my 

 horse, and was sorry to find that in falling he had cut 

 himself rather severely, and was so lame that there was 

 nothing for it but to make for the waggon ; and a long 

 weary journey I had of it, my after rider having carefully 

 taken himself off, leaving me to go some fifteen miles 

 dragging a leg-weary and lame horse across a country 

 which at the best I knew but imperfectly, and with only 

 about an hour of daylight remaining. However, a fine 

 moonlight night came to my help, and I reached camp 

 between ten and eleven o'clock, after a sixteen hours' 

 absence. 



I found that R. had made the very unusually large 

 bag of nine eland, five bulls and four cows, thus making 

 up our total to thirteen head. Several of his, he said, 

 were very large animals ; but my bull turned out to be a 

 third larger than any of them ; and the inhabitants of a 

 neighbouring village afterwards told us that he was a well- 

 known animal, celebrated for his unusual size, as well as 

 for the skill with which he had hitherto evaded all 

 attempts on his safety; always feeding on the highest 

 and most inaccessible positions, where danger from above 

 was impossible, and from below would be easily seen, 

 always accompanied by half a dozen wary old cows, all of 

 which acted as sentinels when he slept, and, when he 

 descended into the thorn country, invariably having a 

 body-guard of gnu, whose wonderful instinct and power 

 of scent, added to their naturally suspicious nature, render 

 them the most difficult antelopes of all to approach. 



The next day was devoted to skinning and cutting up 

 the meat ready for curing, and as soon as ever the hot 



M 



