ABUNDANCE OF GAME 
89 
ing. I was very glad when morning broke at last, and the 
men came to let me out of my little prison. 
After a cup of coffee, I went out again to try and get a 
wart hog, where we had seen them before ; but although 
we saw plenty of tracks, which were by no means old, we saw 
no pig. We saw three zebras and several oryx, but could 
not get near them. When I got home to breakfast, some 
men came in, having driven past the camp an enormous 
number of camels, and reported Abyssinians in my guide’s 
village, who were asking to see him. So far we had been 
lucky in not meeting with these gentlemen. 
In the afternoon I found a young ‘ owl ’.gazelle, which I 
caught, and as we had no milch goats with us, it was of no 
use attempting to rear it, so I tied it with a bit of rope to 
a tree, and hid in the bushes close at hand. The gazelle 
began to bleat, when up ran a large herd of ‘ owl.’ When 
within some 15 yards of me they got my wind, and would 
come no nearer, but stood sniflSng and craning their necks 
to look at the baby antelope. I watched this pretty sight 
for upwards of half an hour, the herd consisting for the 
most part of mothers and babies, with a few old bucks with 
good heads. At last I showed myself, and they ran away, 
and stood again about 300 yards off. I then let loose the 
baby ‘owl,’ and with a few frantic kicks and jumps in the 
air he galloped off, bleating, to the herd, which also 
advanced to meet the recent prisoner, receiving him with 
joy, and licking him all over. 
We then went a long round without seeing any- 
thing worth a shot, until we came to an open plain which 
we had not visited before. Here we found a herd of 
almost 100 zebra^ a great many oryx, and countless herds 
of ‘owl.’ The zebra caught sight of my shikari, who, as 
usual, absolutely refused to crawl, and for several seconds 
I could see nothing but dust, and hear a great rumbling 
noise of retreating hoofs. Coming home, I saw an ‘ owl ’ 
with an extra good head, at which I determined to expend 
one cartridge, as I had been firing away my ammunition 
