128 THE LAND OF THE LION 



there is space between the bushy clumps to see what you 

 shot at, a charging buffalo with lowered head, should be 

 easy to stop. The great broad shoulders and neck offering 

 a mark which is almost impossible to miss. Such a country 

 is that round the upper waters of the Guasi Nyiro end of 

 the north, and usually these animals are very plentiful here. 



Thickets near the water side, or on mountain land, 

 are a totally different matter. No one who has not tried 

 to force a way through African cover, can have any idea 

 of its holding qualities. Legs, arms, rifle, hat, may be 

 tied down, dragged back, plucked over your eyes, all at 

 the same moment. For long distances you must crawl 

 through dark, leafy, prickly, tunnels, where you can see 

 nothing ahead of you. So handicapped, the best shot in 

 the world has a poor chance for his life, with the rhino or 

 buffalo. 



The rhino blunders on top of you. The buffalo lays 

 in wait for you, cunningly chooses his position near his 

 own retreating spoor, but to one side. He has doubled 

 back on his course to do so. And when he sees you, and 

 you cannot see him, charges home, nothing but death stop- 

 ping his rush. 



I have known of a good man killed in the evening by 

 a buffalo he had wounded in the morning, and whose spoor 

 he had for many hours abandoned. He was coming back 

 to camp through the same country he hunted in the morning. 

 As he did so he unfortunately chanced to pass close to the 

 spot where all day long, the wounded beast had awaited 

 his enemy. He was killed almost instantly. 



I was, as I think now, foolish enough in just such a 

 covert, to follow the first buffalo I had wounded, for four 

 hours. There, several times, he doubled on his track, and 

 stood waiting till I came up and passed him by. It was quite 

 impossible to see him. His heart must have failed 

 him at the last moment, for all the sign I had of him was 



