TWO DIANAS IN SOMALILAND 109 



To return to the subject in hand again. Just imagine 

 a well-looked-after camel-man deliberately going and 

 making a meal of doubtful meat just because it was 

 forbidden him. Ah, well ! is it not said that " the 

 dearest pleasure of the delicately nurtured is a furtive 

 meal of tripe and onions"? Perhaps our follower took 

 the beef as a surreptitious dish of that kind. The 

 analogy may seem a little " out," but it is there if you 

 look for it. 



One day, somewhere about this time, I was fortunate 

 enough to witness a great and splendid sight, a battle 

 to the death between two bull oryx. I had been 

 lunching on sandwiches of their kind — alas ! their 

 poor brother ! — and was resting awhile on the verge 

 of a thick bit of country, a natural clearing with thick 

 thorn cover around. I kept very silent — I was in fact 

 very sleepy — when I heard the war challenge of some 

 genus buck, imperious and ringing, and not far away. 

 It was replied to instantly. Again it sounded louder 

 and nearer. I raised myself and looked about. From 

 out the dense brushwood, but a few hundred yards away, 

 and from opposite sides, sprang a fine up-standing 

 oryx. Crash ! And the great bulls were at each other. 

 Clawing with hoofs and teeth and rapier horns. Then 

 backwards they would sidle, and each taking a flying 

 start would come together with a sickening crash, and 

 all the while each tried every possible tactic to drive 

 the merciless horns home. I held my breath with 

 excitement, as in theirs I was permitted to creep almost 

 up to the panting, foam-flecked warriors. I could have 

 shot both, but as I was strong so was I merciful. It 



