284 AFRICAN NATURE NOTES CHAP. 



getting a supply of game meat, and whom I found 

 very useful as guides from one pool of water to 

 another, as well as to clear a path for the waggon 

 by chopping down small trees and bushes wherever 

 this was necessary ; for we were travelling across 

 country, towards the setting sun, without a road or 

 track of any kind, where never a waggon had 

 passed before. 



One afternoon, leaving the Bushmen with the 

 waggon, as there were a few bushes and small trees 

 to be chopped down here and there, I rode on 

 ahead, telling them to follow on my horse's tracks. 

 After having ridden slowly forwards for about an 

 hour and a half through country sparsely covered 

 with low bushes and small trees, I waited until the 

 waggon came in sight, and then rode on again. 

 About an hour before sunset, I found myself 

 approaching a deep depression in the ground, 

 around which grew several large trees. Feeling 

 sure that this hollow would prove to hold a good 

 supply of water, I rode towards it, and suddenly 

 caught sight of the head of a tsessebe antelope 

 through the fringe of long grass which surrounded 

 the pool. I immediately ducked down, and slipping 

 off my horse's back, left him standing" in the long 

 grass, and crawled cautiously forwards. 



On reaching the edge of the cup-shaped hollow, 

 I saw beneath me a deep pool of water, some thirty 

 yards in diameter, and between the circumference 

 of the water and the ring of long grass which grew 

 all round the top edge of the hollow was a piece 

 of sloping ground some ten yards in width, free of 

 grass or any vegetation whatever. On this bare 

 ground, just opposite to me, stood two tsessebe 

 antelopes. They were both standing motionless, 

 with their heads turned away from me. Being on 

 sloping ground, their hind-quarters were lower than 

 their shoulders. I had not seen an antelope of any 



