158 LARGE GAME. chap. hi. 



stood, allowing me to run up to within fifty yards and 

 knock the other over dead. I then had to act the part of 

 retriever, and ran the broken-legged one until she lay 

 down, dead beat, and I cut her throat, during which time 

 I might have killed the other two again and again with 

 the greatest of ease, and indeed was rather tempted to do 

 so, as they were very little, if anything, smaller than 

 their mothers. However, I fired at nothing more, though 

 the country was swarming with gnu, sassabi, zebra, and 

 impalla, and one herd of the latter that I saw was the 

 largest I ever came across, and must, I computed, have 

 contained about nine hundred head. 



The next day was the one to which I have gradually 

 been coming — the one on which I found the eland. H. 

 and I started early, and walked together so far, though 

 we agreed that it would be better to separate before we 

 came to the game. Before doing so, however, I made a 

 successful shot at a bull sassabi that had been feeding on 

 the ridge where we were, and which, after watching us 

 suspiciously for some time, was just jumping away when 

 I fired from about one hundred and twenty yards distance. 

 There was no immediate effect, and he whisked his tail 

 and galloped off, apparently hi the best of health, till, 

 after a few hundred yards, he suddenly pulled up, and 

 after a short stagger fell not to rise again, the ball 

 having struck him in the centre of his chest and gone 

 through and through him. 



Luckily for me, H., who was hide-hunting, thought it 

 worth while to send one of his men to report the beast's 

 death in camp, so that I was enabled to proceed at once, 

 and to keep both my men with me. Going on, I saw a 



