CHAP. VIII.] 
UNSUCCESSFUL HUNT. 
343 
uncertain. The wind whistled in my ears as we flew 
along over the open plain. The grass was not more 
than a foot high, and the ground hard;—the giraffes 
about four hundred yards distant steaming along, and 
raising a cloud of dust from the dry earth, as on this 
side of the mountains there had been no rain. Filfil 
was a contradiction; he loved a hunt and had no fear 
of wild animals, but he went mad at the sound of a 
gun. Seeing the magnificent herd of about fifteen 
giraffes before him, the horse entered into the excite¬ 
ment and needed no spur—down a slight hollow, flying 
over the dry buffalo holes, now over a dry watercourse 
and up the incline on the other side—then again on 
the ievel, and the dust in my eyes from the cloud 
raised by the giraffes showed that we were gaining in 
the race; misericordia !—low jungle lay before us—the 
giraffes gained it, and spurring forward through a 
perfect cloud of dust now within a hundred yards of 
the game we shot through the thorny bushes. In 
another minute or two I was close up, and a splendid 
bull giraffe was crashing before me like a locomotive 
obelisk through the mimosas, bending the elastic boughs 
before him in his irresistible rush, which sprang back 
with a force that would have upset both horse and 
rider had I not carefully kept my distance. The jungle 
seemed alive with the crowd of orange red, the herd 
