144 AFRICA SPEAKS 



In this vast country nothing goes to waste — animal 

 feeds upon bird and bird upon animal, some even upon 

 their kind, the insects and worms finishing whatever 

 they leave. I have often returned after a few days 

 to the scene of an animal's death to find absolutely 

 nothing there. Although I have traversed many 

 thousands of miles of African veldt and jungle, I can 

 only remember finding a few bones, and these were 

 being disposed of as quickly as possible by ants and 

 other insects. 



People have often asked me how the time was 

 passed during the evening, suggesting that we must 

 have been very lonesome. Personally, I never had 

 time to get lonesome, for, after returning from the 

 day's field work, all I had to do was write up my daily 

 notes, develop films, load the magazines for next day, 

 develop tests, pack films, number and file negatives, 

 write caption sheets for motion pictures and still nega- 

 tives, prepare packages for mailing, stick on several 

 kinds of labels, eat dinner, doctor the sick natives, 

 give orders for the next day, check up on the amount 

 of stores and water in camp, chase a couple of hyenas 

 out of the kitchen, and then, if nothing unusual came 

 up to occupy my time, I would go to bed. 



On this night I went to bed early for I needed the rest 

 badly. I got into bed all right, but not to sleep, for 

 we had a plague of hyenas around the camp. I had 

 learned to take them more or less as a matter of course, 

 but this night the place seemed to swarm with these 

 pests and they proceeded to hold a laughing and 

 growling contest right behind my tent. I became 

 fed up on the noise and went out with a rifle, swearing 

 vengeance on the whole hyena clan, but when I stuck 



