20 Three Months' Leave in Somali Land. 



and 1.30 p.m. till 5.45 p.m. Did a good twenty- 

 eight miles to-day. Direction south till 3.15, 

 when I got into hilly country, direction south- 

 east. Camped in an old zereba. Thick jungle 

 here, no open bits. Shot guinea-fowl, 303, 50 

 yards. Saw no game except two does of lesser 

 koodoo. No sign of Abyssinians. 



21st, Sunday. — Marched 5 a.m. till 7.30 a.m. 

 Came on fresh pugs of rhino ; ordered a halt and 

 tracked from 7.30 till 11.30, mostly through grass 

 over my head and dense thorn-bush ; lost track, 

 took a cast ahead through some very thick grass 

 about shoulder high. Rush in the grass about 

 sixty yards ahead, just saw a bit of the back of 

 a red animal, for a second, took it for oryx from 

 colour ; did not fire. Found that I had lost a 

 chance (and a very hard chance) at a rhino. 

 Another of the illusions of my boyhood vanished. 

 I thought the black rhino was black. He's 

 not here ; he's just a brick colour ! The soil 

 being dark red sand and there being no water, I 

 ought to have expected the unwashed rhino, 

 to be the colour of mother earth, but 1 didn't. 

 Saw lots of rhino pugs on road. At Jugli at 5 

 p.m. found two of my camels waiting for me 



