TWO DIANAS IN SOMALILAND 285 



life. Any easily avoided disaster is accepted in this 

 fashion. 



The head-man gave us all the particulars. A 

 leopard had indeed entered the karia, killed a sheep, 

 and then left the carcase. We begged for the remains, 

 and for a consideration got them. Clarence bestowed 

 them at the foot of the rise in open ground, by a brake 

 of aloes and thick cover. The men set about con- 

 structing a " machan " in the jungly place, and kept 

 guard till sunset, when Cecily and I took the job on. 

 We climbed into our refuge ; it was intensely rickety, 

 and rocked every time we made the least movement. 

 I was no more enamoured of this sort of sport than 

 before, and suppose we were doing it because we felt the 

 trip being so nearly over it was foolish now to miss 

 any chance whatever. For once in a way we were 

 both rather uninterested, a fatal frame of mind in this 

 sort of an affair. We were bitterly cold, and I could 

 hardly hold my rifle at all. Hours seemed to drag 

 along, minutes really. I had to strike a light, whatever 

 the consequence, to ascertain the time. It was 

 12 a.m. Oh, for bed and this sort of sport at an end ! 

 Another weary silence. I slept, I believe, with one 

 eye open. Then an ominous rustle, and a lightning 

 whirr and rush, succeeded by a blank silence again. 

 Whatever had happened now ? We listened and 

 gazed attentively, but no more sounds reached our 

 straining ears. Over all the jungle brooded a stillness 

 that could almost be felt. Then Cecily, whose sight 

 is better than mine, said it was plain to be seen even 

 in the blackness that surrounded us that the carcase of 



