162 
AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 
ing two hundred and sixty pounds; for topi are some¬ 
what smaller than kongoni. The beauty of its coat, in 
texture and coloring, struck me afresh as I looked at the 
sleek creature stretched out oh the grass. Like the eland, 
it was free from ticks; for the hideous pests do not fre¬ 
quent this part of the country in any great numbers. 
I reached camp early in the afternoon, and sat down at 
the mouth of my tent to enjoy myself. It was on such occa¬ 
sions that the ‘‘Pigskin Library’' proved itself indeed a 
blessing. In addition to the original books we had picked 
up one or two old favorites on the way: Alice’s Adventures, 
for instance, and Fitzgerald—I say Fitzgerald, because 
reading other versions of Omar Khayyam always leaves 
me with the feeling that Fitzgerald is the major partner in 
the book we really like. Then there was a book I had 
not read, Dumas’s “Louves de Machecoul.” This was 
presented to me at Port Said by M. Jusserand, the brother 
of an old and valued friend, the French ambassador at 
Washington—the vice-president of the “Tennis Cabinet.” 
We had been speaking of Balzac, and I mentioned regret¬ 
fully that I did not at heart care for his longer novels ex¬ 
cepting the “Chouans”; and, as John Hay once told me, 
in the eye of all true Balzacians to like the “Chouans” 
merely aggravates the offence of not liking the novels which 
they deem really great. M. Jusserand thereupon asked 
me if I knew Dumas’s Vendean novel; being a fairly good 
Dumas man, I was rather ashamed to admit that I did not; 
whereupon he sent it to me, and I enjoyed it to the full. 
The next day was Kermit’s red-letter day. We were 
each out until after dark; I merely got some of the ordinary 
game, taking the skins for the naturalists, the flesh for our 
