B1V0UACK. 199 



our tent, and having kindled a fire, soon made our- 

 selves comfortable for the night. I regretted that the 

 hyaena had fled before we could get our guns ready, 

 as we had not been hitherto successful in obtaining 

 a specimen of this animal, which is much more 

 formidable and voracious in the interior of Caffer- 

 land than in the vicinity of the Cape, where it is 

 naturally shy, and retreats at the approach of man. 

 This may be accounted for by the frequent wars 

 which occur between the various tribes, who never 

 bury their dead ; the bodies in consequence lie scat- 

 tered over the plains after a battle, and soon find 

 sepulchres in the ravenous maws of hyaenas. 



" Oh ! to see th' unburied heaps, 

 On which the lonely moon-light sleeps ! 

 The very vultures turn away, 

 And sicken at so foul a prey ; 

 Only the fierce Hysena stalks 

 Through the lone desert's dreary walks 

 At midnight, and his carnage plies : 

 "Woe to the half-dead wretch who meets 

 The glaring of those large blue eyes 

 Amid the darkness of the skies !" 



Mr. Shepstone, in a letter from Mamboland, re- 

 lates that the nightly attacks of wolves, as the hyaenas 

 are generally called, have been so destructive amongst 

 the children and youth, as to form quite an anomaly 

 in the history of this animal ; for within a few 

 months not fewer than forty instances came to his 

 own knowledge, wherein that beast had made most 



