With Flashlight and Rifle -* 



to the rear. The bucks have a particularly solemn 

 appearance as they slowly swerve round to eye one, 

 holding their necks very stiffly under the great weight 

 of their horns. The smaller females, however, are the 

 embodiment of graceful motion itself, and know well how 

 to circumvent the stratagems of the hunter. 



During the spring months Grant's gazelle is much 

 harassed by a species of parasite discovered by myself, and 

 also by a new species of gadfly which I found on it. 

 The larvae of the first-mentioned parasite pierce through 

 the skin of the animals, causing much pain ; the effect 

 is very bad on the venison. This gazelle is not dependent 

 on water, and is often found far out on the velt a good 

 distance from the watering-places. 



I once came very near being done for by a female 

 Grant's gazelle, furnished with a pair of stately horns 

 with very sharp points. My friend Alfred Kaiser had 

 taken a walk with me in the direction of the Meru 

 Mountains on the occasion of my first visit to East 

 Africa. We were resting close by a pitfall made by 

 the natives, in which a rhinoceros had been captured 

 the night before, when we suddenly noticed a solitary 

 Grant's gazelle on a hill some distance off. Armed with 

 my friend's rifle, with which I was unfamiliar, I got nearer 

 to the gazelle, and took aim when about three hundred 

 paces off, using a large-bore cartridge. The wounded 

 gazelle immediately came running clown the hill and 

 made for me, bleating loudly. Her young was evidently 

 hidden in the grass not far from where I stood. At first 

 I could not believe my eyes ; but at the last moment I 



'518 



