HUNTING IN THE SOTIK 
191 
Roberts’ gazelle at two hundred and seventy. Meanwhile 
the other two had killed a kongoni and five of the big ga¬ 
zelles; wherever possible the game being hallalled in ortho¬ 
dox fashion by the Mahometans among our attendants, 
so as to fit it for use by their coreligionists among the por¬ 
ters. Then we saw some giraffes, and galloped them to 
see if there was a really big bull in the lot. They had a 
long start, but Kermit and Tarlton overtook them after 
a couple of miles, while I pounded along in the rear. How¬ 
ever there was no really good bull, Kermit and Tarlton 
pulled up, and we jogged along toward the koppies where 
two days before I had shot the lioness. I killed a big bus¬ 
tard, a very handsome, striking-looking bird, larger than a 
turkey, by a rather good shot at two hundred and thirty 
yards. 
It was now mid-day, and the heat waves quivered above 
the brown plain. The mirage hung in the middle distance, 
and beyond it the bold hills rose like mountains from a 
lake. In mid-afternoon we stopped at a little pool, to give 
the men and horses water; and here Kermit’s horse sud¬ 
denly went dead lame, and we started it back to camp with 
a couple of men, while Kermit went forward with us on 
foot, as we rode round the base of the first koppies. After 
we had gone a mile loud shouts called our attention to one 
of the men who had left with the lame horse. He was 
running back to tell us that they had just seen a big maned 
lion walking along in the open plain toward the body of 
a zebra he had killed the night before. Immediately Tarl¬ 
ton and I galloped in the direction indicated, while the 
heart-broken Kermit ran after us on foot, so as not to miss 
the fun; the gun-bearers and saises stringing out behind 
