Vultures and Adjutant Bird 



to me, and fired again. The bullet went truly, 

 hitting a cow low in the throat ; she dropped 

 at once to the shot. I then got up, Cooe, who 

 had been in hiding, joining me. On opening the 

 bull, I found that the bullet had penetrated 

 both lungs, mushrooming, and remained against 

 the skin on the other side. The cow I hit through 

 the heart, which was somewhat of a lucky shot. 

 The bull's horns were an excellent pair, and I 

 was delighted with the head, for I had not killed 

 one of these long-faced, weird-looking animals 

 before. I cut off the heads and neck-skins and 

 prepared to leave the spot. Cooe was carrying 

 amongst other things my camera. I meant to 

 send out ten or twelve boys to bring in all the 

 meat they could carry, and to tell a local chief, 

 whose kraal we had passed earlier in the day, 

 that he could have what remained. When I fired 

 the shots I did not see a vulture anywhere, but 

 within five minutes after the bull was dead 

 they came dropping from the clouds and appar- 

 ently from nowhere, some taking stand on an old 

 dead tree some hundreds of yards off, whilst 

 others were on the ground in the near vicinity. 

 After leaving the kills I retraced my steps after 

 having gone perhaps a hundred yards, and in 

 that short space of time both animals were 

 black with vultures there must have been 

 over a hundred of them. There was, too, a huge 

 old adjutant bird, who was getting busy on the 



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