140 After Big Game in Central Africa 



the temperature was admirably suited for the prepara- 

 tion of these large specimens, which are so apt to 

 spoil. We have always at the camp ten or twelve 

 children from neighbouring villages, who, at our 

 request and paid by us, collect small animals. These 

 young hunters set out every morning under the 

 direction of a man with cages, traps, and boxes, and 

 return in the evening with their prey. Thus, we 

 have added to our collections varieties of tortoises, 

 birds, small mammals, and insects, which we should 

 otherwise have never been able to obtain. 



At the time in question I had occasion to notice 

 an anomaly among the elands met with in the 

 mitsagnas (mopane or bauhinias) woods. The males, 

 instead of having a tuft of hair at the base of the 

 horns and on the forehead, have short hair like the 

 females, giving them quite a different appearance. I 

 attribute this peculiarity to their thorny habitat, 

 unless it be they belong to another variety of areas 

 canna. 



One day I made a very pretty double shot in these 

 mitsagnas. Some elands having set off unexpectedly 

 and passed before us at full gallop thirty yards away, 

 I fired and killed two of them, one after the other. 

 As luck would have it, I had fired a little too much 

 in front each time, and struck them on the neck, which 

 is fatal to them. To bring down an animal as big as 

 an omnibus horse with each barrel, to roll it over as 

 though it were a rabbit, is a pleasure which one does 

 not often experience. That day I used the Express 

 No. 2 because this weapon was the first which came 



