Long Shot -with the Four-ounce. 53 



three hundred yards distance and slowly cantered off. 

 I tried the long two-ounce rifle at him, but, taking too 

 great an elevation, I fired over him. The report, how- 

 ever, had the effect of turning him, and, instead of re- 

 treating, he wheeled round and attempted to pass 

 between the guns and the banks of the lake. We were 

 about three hundred yards from the water's edge, and 

 he was soon passing us at full gallop at right-angles 

 about mid-way or a hundred and fifty yards distant. 



I had twelve drachms of powder in the four-ounce 

 rifle, and I took a flying shot at his shoulder. No 

 visible effect was produced, and the ball ricochetted 

 completely across the broad surface of the lake (which 

 was no more than a mile wide at this part) in con- 

 tinuous splashes. The gun-bearers said I had fired 

 behind him, but I had distinctly heard the peculiar 

 " fut" which a ball makes upon striking an animal, and 

 although the passage of the ball across the lake ap- 

 peared remarkable, nevertheless I felt positive that it 

 had first passed through some portion of the animal. 



Away the bull sped over the plain at unabated speed 

 for about two hundred paces, when he suddenly turned 

 and charged toward the guns. On he came for about 

 a hundred yards, but evidently slackening his speed at 

 every stride. At length he stopped altogether. His 

 mouth was wide open, and I could now distinguish a 

 mass of bloody foam upon his lips and nostrils — the ball 

 had in reality passed through his lungs, and, making its 

 exit from the opposite shoulder, it had even then flown 

 across the lake. This was the proof of the effect of 

 the twelve drachms of powder. 



Having reloaded, I now advanced toward him, and 

 soon arrived within fifty paces. He was the facsimile 



5* 



