A Breath from the Veldt 



121 



boar of this species easily carries off the palm, and the nightmarish repulsion of 

 his wicked little eyes so intensifies his ugliness as to make him about as 

 loathsome a specimen of animal life as can anywhere be seen.^ But, despite 

 his appearance, there is a force of character and a dogged determination about 

 him that one cannot but admire. Those splendidly white, gleaming tusks too, 

 curled up so gracefully at the points, remind one strongly of some grizzled old 

 warrior with his white moustache carefully trained to represent the fierceness of 

 his profession. As to his disposition, like that of the white-tailed gnu, accounts 



TAWNY EAGLE STOOPING AT WOUNDED STEINBUCK 



differ widely. From sportsmen of excitable nature one hears stories of such 

 astounding bravery and ferocity that a man who is going to tackle the animal for 

 the first time may well expect to find in him as formidable an enemy as a lion 

 or a buflfalo. I cannot believe, however, that the wart-hog is the dangerous 

 beast he is made out to be. Most of the larger African animals — even 

 antelopes — when wounded, will charge if the hunter incautiously approaches 

 them too closely while they are still able to use their legs ; and this is probably all 

 that can be said of the wart-hog. Nearly all the accidents that arise in this way 



' The wart-hog cannot be said to be the wild boar of South Africa only, for he ranges over nearly the 

 whole of the great continent, with the exception of the west and extreme north. 



