no THE BONDS OF AFRICA 



little creature on two legs arrives on murder 

 bent, and then there is righteous indignation in 

 the Principality of the Pleistocene. 



Rhino after rhino I found in this domain of 

 the savage. Four I shot; others I did not 

 trouble to hunt. One I tried vainly to photo- 

 graph in life, but the dense forests defeated my 

 object, and the great, stupid, blundering beast 

 evaded me. Often in the cold dark hours before 

 the dawn, when the camp-fires had burned low, 

 and silence — deep, dominating silence — pervaded 

 all, I awoke to find a native standing by my 

 bed and whispering, " Bwana, chipembere fika " 

 (" Master, the rhinoceros comes). For a few 

 moments the vast silence seemed to give the lie 

 to the anxious tone of the " boy," and then the 

 sharp crack of a twig, a rustling of the grass, or 

 the heavy tread of the great feet told that a 

 rhinoceros was passing by, and the cracking 

 twigs were but the dullest notes of this pachy- 

 dermal nocturne. There are few more memorable 

 moments in the life of man than a few seconds 

 such as these; particles of time fraught with 

 the delirium of an excitement absolute and 

 supreme. Huddled round your bed are little 

 groups of natives, anxious, alarmed, alert; and 

 when, presently, the sound of the monster's 

 march dies away in the night air, the little 

 groups talk quietly among themselves and ponder 

 on the morrow and what it may bring forth. 

 When the sun has thrown his cloak of tender 

 gold o'er forest and plain you may see four men 

 trudging through the thorn bushes, scaling stony 

 paths on the edge of the mountain-land, pushing 

 on with eyes bent on the ground for the tell-tale 

 tracks, ears all a-listening for the least sound; 



