AN EXCITING ENCOUNTER. 
247 
at the same time got ii glimpse of a huge mass behind her. 
which made me wait, as I was certain it was an immense bull 
by the size of the footmarks ; another snort and another 
rush, and they w^ere off a third time. We found now that 
there were five of theiii — with two thundering big tracks 
of two huge bulls, so I determined to follow them, and after 
a good long chull again came in sight of them. I saw^ the 
body of one of the big ones standing broadside on about 
sixty paces off, so I let drive, and as it rushed away, knew 
I had hit from the quantity of blood ilowing, and had the 
satisfaction of seeing, from the footmarks, that it came from 
one of the big bulls. We had not gone far before we found 
it lying dead. The other big bull was just behind a bamboo 
clump ; I moved on one side to get a fairer shot, and just as 
I pulled the trigger it snorted and bolted, Atley declaring I 
had made a hit. We went back to the dead one, and to my 
astonishment found it was a cow ; the largest I had ever 
seen, and with the largest horns. After taking the tongue, w*e 
took up the track of the bull, about which there could be 
no mistake this time, for there were the footprints^ so much 
larger than the others. There was a great quantity of blood 
at first but it gradually lessened till there was only a drop or 
two here and there; we had a long track and at last just as we 
got into the thick bushy underwood and amongst the young 
teaky looking stuff we heard the bison rush away close in 
front, but the bush was too thick to see through ; following as 
best we could, we heard it breathing heavily a litde beyond 
us. I was in this dense underwood and was in the act of 
creeping through it to get in front of the animal when 1 
suddenly heard a rush to my right and the bison was upon 
me with its head down between its forelegs. I attempted to 
