THE GUASO NYERO 
315 
covered horns, but with the front teeth of the lower 
jaw. She waked, looked at me, and then, rearing slightly, 
struck at me with her left foreleg, the blow falling short. I 
laughed and leaped back, and the other men ran up shout¬ 
ing. But the giraffe would not run away. She stood within 
twenty feet of us, looking at us peevishly, and occasionally 
pouting her lips at us, as if she were making a face. We 
kept close to the tree, so as to dodge round it, under the 
branches, if she came at us; for we would have been most 
reluctant to shoot her. I threw a stick at her, hitting her 
in the side, but she paid no attention; and when Bakhari 
came behind her with a stick she turned sharply on him 
and he made a prompt retreat. We were laughing and 
talking all the time. Then we pelted her with sticks 
and clods of earth, and, after having thus stood within 
twenty feet of us for three or four minutes, she cantered 
slowly off for fifty yards, and then walked away with lei¬ 
surely unconcern. She was apparently in the best of health 
and in perfect condition. She did not get our wind; but 
her utter indifference to the close presence of four men is 
inexplicable.* 
On each of the two days we hunted this little district we 
left camp at sunrise, and did not return until eight or nine 
in the evening, fairly well tired, and not a little torn by the 
thorns into which we blundered during the final two hours’ 
walk in the darkness. It was hot, and we neither had nor 
wished for food, and the tepid water in the canteens lasted 
* After writing the above account I read it over to Mr. Cuninghame so as to be sure 
that it was accurate in all its details. All the game was tame in this locality, even 
the giraffe, but no other giraffe allowed us to get within two hundred yards, and 
most of them ran long before that distance was reached, even when we were stalking 
carefully. 
