ii8 BIG GAME SHOOTING 



attempt to think it out the mist came eddying thicker, and I 

 was content to let it be. Presently a dim confused impression 

 that I was following some animal was with me, as in a dream ; 

 the power of framing and articulating a sentence returned, and 

 I drowsily asked the nearest Kafir which way the trail led. He 

 pointed in the direction we were going ; his manner struck me, 

 but I had had my say, and no other remark was ready. Men 

 met us ; among them I recognised two of my Hottentot 

 drivers carrying a ' cartel,' or cane framework, which served as 

 a swinging bedstead in my waggon. ' Where are you going ? ' I 

 asked in Dutch. They stared stupidly ; ' Why, we heard you 

 were killed by a rhinoceros ! ' ' No,' I answered. Without a 

 thought of what had occurred, my right hand fell faintly from 

 the pommel of my saddle to my thigh ; with the restlessness of 

 weakness I drew it up again ; a red splash of blood upon my 

 cuff caught my eye. I raised my arm to see what was the 

 matter ; finding no wound on it, I sought with my hand for it 

 down my leg, through a rent in my trousers, and, so numbed 

 was all sensation, that I actually dabbled down to the bone in 

 a deep gash, eight inches long, without feeling any pain the 

 smaller horn had penetrated a foot higher up, but the wound 

 was not so serious as the lower one. The limb stiffened after 

 I reached the waggons, and, unable to get in and out, I made 

 my bed for nearly four weeks under a bush the rip, healing 

 rapidly, covered with a rag kept constantly wet. 



The rhinoceros, as I afterwards learnt from the men who 

 were with me, was running so fast when she struck me and 

 lifted me so high, that she had shot ahead before I fell, and, 

 on their shouting, passed on without stopping. The horns, as is 

 generally the case in this variety, were of nearly an equal length, 

 so that one to a certain extent checked the penetration of the 

 other as it would be more difficult to drive a double-spiked 

 nail than a single one. The bone of the thigh, however, 

 providentially turned the foremost horn, or it must have passed 

 close to, even if it had not cut, the femoral artery. 



