HOW TO TEEAT A CHARGING HERD. 191 



It was remarked that we saw the foot-prints of neither 

 tigers nor panthers during this trip, although there was no 

 want of suitable covert, or of their choicest food; whether 

 beef, venison, or pork. The country traversed was sufficiently 

 open to admit of hunting on horseback, but it was so cut up 

 by buffaloes while it was moist during the wet season, that 

 horses could not have kept their feet on it, since it was as 

 much as we could do to keep our own in running ; this dif- 

 ficulty excepted, we might have ridden deer and buffalo all 

 over it. It was in this country that a fine sportsman and 

 excellent shot, Dr. C. B. C., narrowly escaped with life, a bull 

 having gored him in two or three places, and inflicted some 

 desperate wounds. 



Our method of firing single shots alternately at charging 

 buffaloes, had this advantage over independent firing, that 

 each bullet, being coolly aimed, found a billet in some head, 

 neck, or shoulder ; whereas when two or three men fire to- 

 gether, there is a certain amount of hurry and unsteadiness, 

 and a great deal of smoke too, which hangs before the rifles 

 when the second barrels ought to come into play. The steady 

 and regularly timed smack, smack, of the bullets upon the 

 tough hides of the beasts, tells most effectually upon them, 

 and shakes their resolution ; and if to that be added the fall 

 of their leaders one after another, the result will almost 

 always be the same as it was this day. 



An unusual occurrence noticed on the same occasion was 

 the turning aside from their course, on the part of a herd of 

 cows while in full career, to charge down upon us from a dis- 

 tance of more than a hundred yards, when they might have 

 put themselves in a minute or two beyond range of our rifles, 

 by holding on in the direct line. 



