THE TROHIY OF A TAIL. -133 



to another. I was the officer in command of the 

 rear-guard, which, you know, has to see that all the 

 baggage is safe ; consequently, as the march was a 

 long one, we did not get into canip till very late. On 

 that occasion, I had a syce beside me with my rifle. 

 He was a sharp-sighted fellow, and declared he saw 

 a wolf enter a patch of bushes near the road. I dis- 

 mounted, and walked towards it, when out rushed 

 the wolf at full gallop, at about eighty yards' dis- 

 tance. I fired, and killed him as dead as a stone, 

 with a bullet behind the shoulder. As a trophy, I 

 sawed off his tail with my regulation sword a 

 piece of old iron that was as blunt as the back of a 

 razor. I remember that, on the same occasion, I 

 killed a bull neilghye, and wounded a gazelle." 



" Pleasant way of performing the duties of officer 

 of the rear-guard," laughed Norman. 



" The only duties were to see that everything was 

 in front. The carts are frightfully slow, and leave 

 lots of time for a little shikar. The neilghye took 

 me a good hour to kill. I was following up the 

 wounded deer, making a very cautious stalk, when 

 I observed a bull neilghye, with several cows, ap- 

 proaching. I broke the fore leg of the bull, being 

 rather low in my aim. He went away witli it 

 dangling, so I followed up, got a close running shot, 

 and killed him dead. As it was too far to 1,p sent 



