102 LIFE WITH THE HAMRAN ARABS. 



for of the common kinds we have all the specimens we 

 require, and for the future shall only shoot them for 

 food; and then, what is far more to the point, our 

 thoughts have taken a higher flight by the sight of 

 numerous tracks of rhinoceros, as well as by the report 

 that we have arrived in. the home also of the lion, 

 giraffe, and ostrich. 



We are becoming most learned in the study of 

 tracks under the tuition of such masters of it as these 

 Hamran Arabs, and hunting for the various animals in 

 this way, even when attended with failure, is in itself a 

 source of immense interest in the day's ride. There are 

 no longer any fresh tracks of elephants, but on the high 

 flat land away from the river, now so baked into a dry 

 crust that it is split up by endless wide fissures, in- 

 numerable deep circular holes give evidence of how 

 much it is frequented by them during or soon after 

 the rainy reason, when the land is saturated with 

 moisture. 



Most of the tracks are very easily distinguished from 

 one another, but those of the camel and giraffe are very 

 similar. The soil is generally very favourable to tracking,, 

 consisting of a light sandy earth in which the impress 

 of the hoof comes out very distinctly, but on the high 

 dry ground no mark is left: The rhinoceros track will 

 interest us most for the present, for though the track of 

 the lion is by no means uncommon, we do not intend to 



