BRITISH EAST AFRICA 227 



charged in most desperate fashion, from where 

 no less than five of the beasts had bolted. 



Below us a herd of impala dashed plainwards 

 with long, graceful bounds and vanished amongst 

 the scrub. A gorgeous panorama of the world 

 abandoned lay stretched out before us. North- 

 wards we could look beyond the sluggish course 

 of the Guaso Nyiro to the knife edge of the Mau ; 

 southwards, to where in the dim distance flat- 

 topped hills ran along the German frontier. 

 Westwards we could gaze on land that was but 

 d day's march distant from Victoria Nyanza, 

 eastwards to the plains that hold the wonderful 

 Soda lake. The light was still good enough to 

 enable us to make out the straggling shapes of 

 great herds of game. Close in to the foot of the 

 hills one or two ostriches moved along grotesquely, 

 and beyond them the camp fires around the 

 water-hole burned and seemed to spell out in 

 twinkles of flame a message of comfort and good 

 cheer. 



These rugged hills, although they held no 

 Kings of Beasts for me, added to my list of 

 trophies spoils that do not often come the way 

 of the hunter. One of these was a Chandler's 

 reed-buck, which I espied one afternoon when 

 scaling the kopjes. These animals, even more 

 so than the klip-springer, are the chamois of 

 Africa, and it was with much joy that I heard 

 my bullet get home with a telling thud, for it 

 was the first of these graceful little antelopes 

 that I had ever shot. The other rarity was a 

 porcupine found one morning in a ravine while 

 I was searching for leopards. That was another 

 red-letter day in my hunting annals, for, in 

 addition to the porcupine, I secured two very 

 good Thomson's gazelle heads and a fair harte- 



