246 A COLONY IN THE MAKING chap. 



Still, many a settler will be prone to spend a holiday 

 after many of these species, some of which are capable 

 of providing excellent sport, more especially elephant, 

 greater kudu, bongo, and sable. 



Towards various species, therefore, the average 

 settler will have mixed feelings. Thus he will have the 

 utmost admiration and respect for the lion on account 

 of the great amount of sport which the latter is capable 

 of providing. The same beast he will detest and abhor 

 when it stampedes his bullocks or decimates his sheep 

 or ostriches. The buffalo, again, will give many a 

 sporting moment, and, in addition, provides a hide 

 which is extremely useful on the farm. The species 

 labours, however, under the taint of giving encourage- 

 ment to the tsetse-fly, and that suspicion even is not a 

 desirable adjunct to a farm. Again, he will dislike 

 and probably clamour for the extermination of the 

 hartebeeste when he finds a broken fence or a trampled 

 field of corn ; but he should bear in mind the almost 

 innumerable days on which a leg or steak of "kongoni" 

 has stood between him and starvation, not to mention 

 the many uses to which he has put its hide. Certain 

 animals seem to stand beyond the pale and to be, 

 speaking plainly, an unmitigated nuisance. Such are 

 the rhinoceros and the common zebra. They provide 

 no sport and they provide no food. No ordinary fenc- 

 ing will stop a single rhino or a herd of zebra ; moreover, 

 the former are apt to be troublesome if not a distinct 

 danger. The only useful end I know which the living 

 rhinoceros affords lies in the hair-breadth escapes with 

 which he provides every touring sportsman, and even 

 these thrills are treated with more scepticism than of 

 yore. His carcase, however, forms the best of all lion 

 baits. A herd of zebra in the sunlight form a lovely 



