CURIOUS SHOT AT A COBRA. 187 



wood I was in yesterday, when I was suddenly startled 

 by a rustle in the grass, and looking up I saw reared up 

 before me, and not more than a yard off, a cobra. It 

 was directly facing me, and, with outstretched hood, must 

 have been on the point of striking. In an instant my 

 rifle was discharged, more to frighten it from its inten- 

 tions than for any other reason ; but, to my astonish- 

 ment, its head was laid low, and beyond a considerable 

 writhing of the body it could not move from its place. 

 When it was clearly dead I examined the wound, and 

 it is a most singular fact that, though the bullet was a 

 twelve-bore spherical one (I had taken out this rifle 

 hoping to test its powers on a buffalo), and therefore of 

 good size, it had passed through the neck so exactly in 

 the median line that it left a thin piece of skin intact on 

 each side attributable no doubt to the hood being out- 

 stretched. My recollection of the boy at Cairo with his 

 performing cobras made me at once recognise my fallen 

 enemy ; and, thankful for the narrow escape I believed I 

 had had, I brought it home in triumph. It measures 

 five feet four inches, and will come in most opportunely, 

 as I promised a friend in London to present him with a 

 snake for a new museum he is forming. 



Our hunters found the horses at Emhaggar, and on 

 their way home they disturbed three lions feeding on 

 the carcass of a buffalo. No time was therefore lost in 

 returning with us to the spot, but so far as seeing any 



