XVI EN ROUTE FOR EL BOGOI 383 



had had no meat for nearly ten days ; but she came along 

 diagonally in our direction, as it were to cut us off, though 

 she was evidently quite unconscious of our presence. It shows 

 how blind these creatures are, that she never saw the caravan 

 with its row of gleaming white tusks marching right across her 

 right front. 



When near meeting her, the men put down their loads, 

 and some bolted for shelter in a little gully, while I took 

 my rifle and sat on a slight prominence to await my chance, 

 determined, since providence had sent a supply of meat into 

 our very hands, to take advantage of it, notwithstanding that 

 it was still a long march to our camping-place for the day. 

 When she got within about a hundred yards or less she 

 seemed to see me. Probably my rifle -barrel glinted in the 

 sun, which had just topped the hills. She turned nearly 

 facing me, and stood with her head up, trying to make me 

 out, giving me the opportunity to plant a .303 bullet at the 

 root of the neck. On receiving it she turned and galloped 

 perhaps two hundred yards ; but I could see by her laboured 

 action, and the way she threw up her forelegs, that she had 

 got enough. Then she stood and tottered about, lifting her 

 forelegs out straight in front of her with a peculiar dancing 

 action, and fell over dead. I wanted to let the calf go, but, as 

 usual, it would not, and the men begged for its meat ; so, as 

 I wanted them to get a good feast after their hard work and 

 short rations, I let it have a bullet just in front of the point 

 of its shoulder, as it stood diagonally head on to me, and it 

 shared its mother's fate after running some hundred yards 

 from her. 



The cow was fat, and the men cut up the meat in high 

 glee and piled it on to their already well-laden shoulders, 

 or heads. I waited for them nearly two hours before I could 

 get them to leave the carcases ; and it was wonderful how 

 little there was then left but hide and bones. The donkey- 

 men, who were sometimes out of it when anything was shot 



