FIRST ANTELOPE STALKED 



appeared, and as the horns seemed to be reasonably good, 

 we determined to stalk them. 



I filled the magazine of the rifle, and directed Turrup to 

 stay with the four ponies where they were, till signalled to 

 come down. The wind was blowing strong towards our 

 left front as we went down, and therefore partly in the 

 direction of the antelope, but still not enough, we thought, 

 to create any danger. The slope of the hillside was uneven, 

 and it was just beyond one of the knolls in the contour of 

 the ground that the three antelope had been seen. 



Some little time before arriving at this knoll, and 

 while ascending another, we suddenly came on a buck 

 feeding by himself, and not more than 80 yards off. 

 As his horns were a fair length, I acted on the prin- 

 ciple that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. 

 I hurriedly lay down, and without noticing that the 200 

 yards' leaf of the rifle was up, fired at the buck. Of 

 course, the bullet went over him. The buck bolted away 

 to the right, and beyond him a herd of some ten kyang 

 also started off. The next cartridge was a missfire (the 

 second I had had that season), and the third bullet also 

 went over the flying animal's back. The buck now turned 

 and went to my left, passing through the herd of kyang, 

 whom he quickly distanced, though the asses too were 

 going at their best pace. Judging that the antelope 

 would be quite 200 yards off before I could send a fourth 

 shot after him, I looked at my sighting with a view to 

 putting the first movable leaf up, and then saw that it 

 was up already. This explained my first miss when the 

 animal was quite close, and put me out so much that I 

 was not anywhere near him with either of the next two 



