TWO DIANAS IN SOMALILAND 287 
to stand a little farther off. This I did not care to 
do. The men were not armed, bar their spears, and 
it seemed unfair to expose them so without giving 
them the protection of one’s rifle. Cecily was 
doing the same thing on her side of the brake, where 
the men were spearing bravely and shouting lustily. 
We fired into the undergrowth, but it was of no avail ; 
still the ominous snarling kept up, still the animal 
would not break cover. I made up my mind I would 
try and see if I could not get a shot into him somehow, 
so I took on the silly job of crawling very slowly down 
the rough trail made through the dense bush by the 
dragging of the sheep. I came on its remains almost 
at once. The leopard, where was he ? Then I saw 
him in one brief second. What a face of rage and fury ! 
I dare not fire. I backed hurriedly, getting clear of the 
place, and then fired twice into the very place where 
I judged the leopard lay up. A rush. Out he came 
rather from the side, looking like a fiend let loose. I 
was glad we were not bang in his path. I could not 
get a shot in at all, for one of the hunters, in the 
warmth of his earnest efforts, put himself in my light. 
There was Cecily, she blazed away ; there was Clarence, 
whose rifle spoke, but I heard his bullet strike a rock 
behind. The leopard, with lithe swinging bounds, 
was up the clefts of the ravine in a moment. I threw 
up my rifle and had a try for him. No result. He 
was lost to sight. Four of the men went to the top 
of the ravine and descended carefully, reporting the 
leopard to be in a sort of cave between two boulders. 
We must get there too, of course, which would be a 
