io8 AFRICAN NATURE NOTES CHAP. 



a Mashuna blacksmith, and so, dismounting, I took 

 this assegai from the Kafir who was carrying it, and 

 advanced on the wounded hysena to give him the 

 coup de grace. When I was still about ten yards 

 away from him, he jumped up and came towards me, 

 not with a rush certainly, but still pretty quickly, 

 and with the evident intent to do grievous bodily 

 harm. As he advanced he repeatedly clacked his 

 jaws together, making a loud noise. I stood my 

 ground with my heavy assegai poised to strike, and 

 when the hyaena was close to me I drove it with 

 all my force into his mouth. His jaws closed in- 

 stantly on the heavy iron blade, nor was I able to 

 again withdraw it, for although the wounded animal 

 bit it all over from one end to the other, he opened 

 and shut his jaws with such surprising quickness 

 that he never lost possession of it. Finally, he pulled 

 the iron blade of the assegai out of its wooden 

 shaft, and then, weakening from loss of blood, fell to 

 the ground, still clashing his jaws on it. He was not 

 able to rise to his feet again, and the Kafirs speared 

 him to death as he lay. I found that the heavy 

 assegai blade had been twisted and bent and bitten 

 in a most extraordinary manner. I kept it for a long 

 time, and wish I still had it in my possession, as it 

 was a veritable curiosity. 



I once caught a hyaena in a very large heavy 

 iron trap, which it required the strength of two 

 ordinary men to set. To this trap I had attached 

 a heavy iron waggon chain, but the other end of 

 this chain was not made fast to anything. I caught 

 this hyaena by hanging up the hind-leg of a sable 

 antelope in a tree by the roadside about a hundred 

 yards from where my waggon was outspanned. 

 The trap was set at the foot of the tree without 

 any bait and carefully covered. The hyaena must 

 have jumped up at the meat and sprung the trap 

 as he came to the ground again. One of the large 



