THE BUSH. 157 



individual taste whether it was a big or a small bore which was fired, and so avoid 

 the much-vexed question of bores. 



Having brought the rhino to bag you have at least his tongue for the larder to 

 keep camp going until you can get some other meat more toothsome. Also, you 

 have gained some fat with which to cook, and a little biltong can be made out of the 

 meat which will serve for soups. You call the porters and they come screeching 

 through the bush. They are even more noisy than usual in their delight at getting 

 so much meat. You quite regret having shot the animal now, as it means the 

 desecration of your hunting-ground and the scaring away of all the game by this 

 howling rabble of porters. The cutting-up operations begin and a revolting orgy 

 follows, so after making arrangements for the various parts you want to keep, and 

 possibly after having traced the bullet to its destination, you return to camp. Later 

 the porters return, each carrying as much meat as he can stagger under, a ration 

 which he will probably finish in a day or two.* Even the Mohammedan porters, if 

 they have been without meat for some time, will find that they are able to establish 

 their rights to eat the animal although it has not been " hallaled." They will say, 

 " It has no neck, therefore its throat cannot be cut, so it is lawful food." This is a 

 ruling which appears to vary considerably with the length of time since they have 

 had meat, or what the Wanyamwezi call " Kitowero."t 



Next day a change of camp is advisable, so you shift down several miles to get 

 an undisturbed hunting-ground. There, as you stroll along one morning, an enormous 

 pig suddenly makes his appearance from behind a bush and leisurely walks past. 

 You whip out glasses to have a good look at so remarkable-looking an object and 

 watch him stroll out of sight behind another bush. It is only then that you realise 

 that he was that seldom-shot animal, the forest-hog. You tiptoe up to the bush 

 behind which he disappeared, for you have no better route to take, but he has heard 

 you or seen you through the bush, and has made off. 



I have never had time to spend more than a few days in the pursuit of this 

 animal. I hoped to get one in the forests near Nandi and the Ravine, but just as I 

 had finished my work there, I was called away suddenly, and so was not able to 

 spend the couple of days I had planned for the hunting of him. He is not entirely 

 confined to forests, as is generally supposed, for I have found traces of him in 

 bush-country in two different localities. 



* I am told that many natives think nothing of eating a whole sheep at a sitting. The Wandorobo, after 

 having gorged themselves with as much meat as they can hold, will sleep by their meat cooking by the fire, and 

 wake up at intervals during the night to cram down a little more. 



t The vulgar pronunciation of the Swahili, " Kitoweo " = meat, fish, or any flavouring eaten with rice 

 or flour. 



