72 AFRICA SPEAKS 



at the first peep of dawn. As soon as the sun arose 

 we found that the entire sky was filled with dark 

 clouds making photography impossible, so walked 

 around the manyatta saying "good morning" to 

 several young ladies who were repairing huts with 

 fresh cow dung. 



Later in the morning we went to our hon donga. 

 En route I shot a kongoni which was placed in the 

 truck and afterwards at the end of our tow rope. We 

 dragged tliis around the donga in an attempt to entice 

 the Hons out, but without results. As we neared their 

 favorite spot, Bud came up in Mike's touring car with 

 the information that he had just seen six hons about 

 one mile away. I transferred to the fast car with my 

 graflex in hopes of securing a few still negatives. Within 

 ten minutes we came upon five of the lot and managed 

 to get up to within twenty feet of them. The fight 

 was very bad and I could not get much heart into the 

 work until later when the sun broke through for a 

 short time, and then we drove to within ten feet 

 of a big male who with a growl sank back on his 

 haunches for a jump. The top was down and I stood 

 up in the back seat to get the picture; Bud looked 

 around and seeing the fion just about ready to spring 

 stepped on the gas ; the car gave a sudden leap forward 

 and I nearly pitched into the fion's mouth. I managed 

 to catch hold of the folded top and, after tetering back 

 and forth for awhile, feU inside the car. We got a 

 good laugh out of this, but it came very close to 

 being a tragedy. 



Next morning, according to instructions, my boy 

 Kahindi awakened me before dawn, but when I found 

 it was raining, I went back to bed until later. It rained 



