^ The Lonely Wonder-world of the Nyika 



by piece become familiar to him. Thus only will all 

 the moving life below him very gradually combine into 

 one splendid and intelligible picture. 



On the way to my look-out hill I pass thousands of 

 the tracks made by wild animals. 



At the very outset, the traveller from northern lands 

 sees a most surprising sight in those hundreds of thousands 

 of tracks made by wild animals, and faithfully preserved for 

 weeks and even for longer periods in the dry season on the 

 plains of Africa. The giants of the animal world leave 

 behind them their mighty footprints, often for nearly 

 a year, holes in which a man will sometimes break his 

 leg. But the footprints of the smaller animals also last 

 a long time on velt and plain. And the language of 

 the wilderness rises to a most effectual appeal to our 

 senses when these tracks are associated with the marked 

 tarry scent of the waterbuck in the bush, the breath of 

 the great wild herds on the plain, the strong scent left 

 by elephant or rhinoceros in the primeval forest and in 

 the sultry thickets, and the scent of the buffalo among 

 the reed-beds. 



There is often a chaos of tracks, a wild maze of 

 paths trodden flat as a barn-floor, crossing each other, 

 and then again uniting, so that the idea of tame herds, 

 mentioned before as at times suggested, can no longer 

 hold good. 



To-day we have again waited patiently to see the 

 wilderness gradually come to life in the hours of the 

 afternoon. And we have not been disappointed. 



Out from the shadows of scattered groups of trees 



213 



