about the way and to look about from side to side 

 for reminders. 



The start back had been easy enough : that part 

 of the ground where we had lost the spoor had been 

 gone over very thoroughly and every object was 

 familiar ; but further back, where we had followed the 

 spoor at a trot for long stretches and I had hardly 

 raised my eyes from the ground before me, it was a 

 very different matter. I forgot all about those long 

 , stretches in which nothing had been noticed except the 

 koodoo spoor, and was unconsciously looking out for 

 things in regular succession which we had passed at 

 [quite long intervals. Of course, they were not to be 

 found, but I kept on looking out for them first feeling 

 annoyed, then puzzled, then worried. Something 

 had gone wrong, and we were not going back on our 

 old tracks. Several times I looked about for the 

 koodoo spoor as a guide ; but it might be anywhere 

 over a width of a hundred yards, and it seemed waste 

 of precious time to search the dry grass-grown and 

 leaf-strewn ground for that. 



At the first puzzled stop I tried to recall some of 

 the more noticeable things we had passed during the 

 chase. There were two flat-topped mimosas, looking 

 like great rustic tables on a lawn, and we had passed 

 between them ; there was a large ant-heap, with a 

 twisty top like a crooked mud chimney, behind which 

 the koodoo bull had calmly stood watching us approach; 

 then a marula tree with a fork like a giant catapult 

 stick ; and so on with a score of other things, all 

 coming readily to mind. 



138 



