JOCK'S first experience in hunting was on 

 the Crocodile River not far from the spot where long 

 afterwards we had the great fight with The Old Croco- 

 dile. In the summer when the heavy rains flood the 

 country the river runs ' bank high,' hiding everything 

 reeds, rocks, islands, and stunted trees in some places ' 

 silent and oily like a huge gorged snake, in others 

 foaming and turbulent as an angry monster. In the 

 rainless winter when the water is low and clear the 

 scene is not so grand, but is quiet, peaceful, and much 

 more beautiful. There is an infinite variety in it 

 then the river sometimes winding along in one 

 deep channel, but more often forking out into two or 

 three streams in the broad bed. The loops and lacings 

 of the divided water carve out islands and spaces of all 

 shapes and sizes, banks of clean white sand or of firm 

 damp mud swirled up by the floods, on which tall 

 green reeds with yellow tasselled tops shoot up like 

 crops of Kaffir corn. Looked down upon from -the 

 flood banks the silver streaks of water gleam brightly 

 in the sun, and the graceful reeds, bowing and swaying 



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