HUNTING IN AFRICA 107 



I remember a friend of mine, who had spent three months 

 in Rhodesia, showing me the result of his trip with pride. 

 I was ignorant then of African game, and so was duly 

 impressed. I know, now, there was scarcely one head in 

 the lot worth keeping. 



He, however, only brought back what he had shot 

 himself, for he was a good sportsman; but the truth is, 

 very many of the bags reported are not made by the men 

 returning them. The professional hunter does much of 

 the shooting, and not seldom skins, tusks, and horns, are 

 bought. It is not hard to forget (at least, some seem to 

 find it easy) what you yourself have or have not shot. 



But is that sort of thing sport ? I am not speaking 

 from haphazard hearsay, but from things that I know. 



I have often seen a would-be salmon fisher on our own 

 rivers, sit reading a novel hour after hour, day after day, 

 in his canoe, while his expert Indian threw a good fly 

 over his shoulder. When the fish was hooked then the 

 sportsman played it, and landed or lost it as the case might 

 be. It takes more than money to make a sportsman. 

 Enough said perhaps on an unpleasant subject. 



In the second place, game is not at all as plentiful as it 

 was even in Africa. You cannot expect to stroll out of 

 camp about eight o'clock, after a late and heavy breakfast 

 and run across what you came out to get. A few years 

 ago the Athi Plains were almost a sure find for lions. I 

 do not believe that to-day one sefari in five gets a lion at 

 all on them. There were a dozen places where with reason- 

 able industry you at least had a chance to get a fifty pound 

 elephant tusk. Now you may visit them one after the other 

 and never see a reasonable tusker. It is the same story 

 with rhino. Five years ago anyone could within a radius 

 of thirty miles of Nairobi, make sure of securing his two 

 heads, with horns measuring over twenty inches. Now 

 rhino scarcely exists in that vicinity at all, and you may 



