IX 



TRAVELS IJV EASTERN- AFRICA 



389 



opposite bank of the river (at that point wide and 

 shallow) the fierce snort of a rhinoceros was heard, 

 and soon my camp was a scene of the wildest confu- 

 sion : men, crying to their far-off mothers for help, 

 stumbled over one another in their frantic . efforts to 

 get behind or up trees. Although I had my rifle in 

 hand, I was unable to shoot, through fear of winging 

 some of my scampering porters. The rhinoceros did 

 not charge through and at once leave the camp ; not 

 he ; stamping on one of the camp-fires seemed to 

 amuse him. Having satisfied his curiosity, or what- 

 ever else prompted him to pay us this nocturnal visit, 

 he moved on with a snort, and disappeared in the 

 bush. 



Not ^only did the country seem to abound with 

 rhinoceroses, but lions also claimed the place as their 

 habitat. The latter, however, gave us no trouble, 

 much to my disappointment, as I had longed to get 

 a fair shot at one. 



On one occasion I saw three very large and beau- 

 tifully maned lions stalk into a growth of bush about 

 200 yards from where I stood, but I was unwilling to 

 stop the caravan in order to pursue them. On an- 

 other occasion we were encamped upon a perfectly 

 bare spot (fifty or sixty acres in extent), and the 

 ground, covered with sulphate of magnesium, gleamed 

 white in the starlight. I was sitting up in a chair one 

 night while at this camp, watching Lieutenant von 

 Hohnel, who at the time seemed very low and suffer- 

 ing a great deal, when I heard one of the Soudanese 

 night-watch fluently blaspheming in Arabic. I shouted 

 to him, and inquired the cause of his strange oaths ; 



