CHAPTER XIV. 

 HYENAS IN A CAVE. 



There are some caves in the Dolomites, west of 

 Pretoria, where a lot of hyenas had their lairs. They 

 had killed some foals belonging to Hans and Rasmus 

 Erasmus on Swartkop. The latter went into the cave 

 with his gun (his Hottentots holding tallow candles), 

 to shoot them, but the concussion of the first shot put 

 the candles out, a hyena caught his hand and bit 

 off two fingers. When he told me this, I determined 

 to have a go at them, so Alex and I with six of my 

 kaffirs, armed with ropes, lanterns, pistols, etc., went 

 there. The kaffirs were afraid to enter, as we had 

 to go down a steep, narrow passage before getting 

 into the big cave, so Alex, and I went alone. He 

 held the one lantern and I had a large pistol, a sword 

 and another lantern. As soon as the hyenas saw 

 the bright reflector lantern, they crept into crevices, 

 lay and blinked their ugly big eyes at the light, 

 which I held right in front of their faces, I shot 

 them easily right between their eyes. I never gave 

 any of them more than one bullet. They made horrid 

 noises and snuffled about, but did not show fight. 

 The concentrated light was too much for them in the 

 dark cave, and the echo of the reports of the pistols 

 frightened them still more. If they had had any 

 pluck, they could have torn us to pieces, but they 

 had not ; I shot nine enormous brutes. We could not 

 find more that day, and could not properly explore 

 the inner cave, as we had no string to mark the way 

 back, and if our lanterns gave out, we would be 

 eaten if any hyenas remained unshot. We had 

 trouble to get the kaffirs to enter the cave, although 



