xxiv BIG GAME SHOOTING 237 



according to locality and different species of game. 

 Nor does the grass ever grow long enough to enforce 

 a natural close season as it does in British Central 

 Africa, Uganda, and other countries. Still, diminish- 

 ing though the game undoubtedly is, it would probably 

 stand in quite sufficient numbers for many years to 

 come. There is one factor, however, which will end 

 the present phase of big game shooting long before 

 that period ; this is the settler, who in the next two 

 or three years will have reclaimed and occupied the 

 whole of the present and healthy part of the game 

 country which is not otherwise specially reserved. 



Let us therefore look ahead and try to sum up what 

 portion of this great sport is likely to be indefinitely 

 preserved to us. In the first place, the settlers them- 

 selves are likely to preserve a great deal of game. 

 Not certainly, except in rare instances, the huge herds 

 of zebra and hartebeeste which are responsible for 

 nine-tenths of the damage and for ninety-nine-hun- 

 dredths of the outcry against preservation of game ; 

 indeed this would be unreasonable to expect, but with 

 the further exception of the rhinoceros and the large 

 carnivora, distinctly undesirable residents on a farm, 

 we may, I think, calculate on the preservation of all 

 other species. The present farmers have, indeed, 

 already shown a strong tendency this way, even to 

 their own disadvantage, as witness the entire preserva- 

 tion of hippo in Lake Naivasha, and of eland through- 

 out the Rift Valley. Assuredly in the future we may 

 look to the presence on many farms of eland, water- 

 buck, wildebeeste, impalla, bushbuck, Thomson's 

 gazelle, reedbuck, etc., which will afford the owner and 

 his guests both excellent sport and welcome change of 

 food. Of course, from such pleasant anticipations our 



