KITANGA 
29 
CH. i] 
sped after it. By the time I had reached my horse 
Pease was out of sight; but, riding hard for some miles, 
I overtook him, just before the sun went down, standing 
by the cow, which he had ridden down and slain. It 
was long after nightfall before we reached camp, ready 
for a hot bath and a good supper. As always thereafter 
with anything we shot, we used the meat for food, and 
preserved the skins for the National Museum. Both 
the cow and the bull were fat and in fine condition ; 
but they were covered with ticks, especially wherever 
the skin was bare. Around the eyes the loathsome 
creatures swarmed so as to make complete rims, like 
spectacles ; and in the armpits and the groin they were 
massed so that they looked like barnacles on an old boat. 
It is astonishing that the game should mind them so 
little; the wildebeest evidently dreaded far more the 
biting flies which hung around them, and the maggots 
of the bot-flies in their nostrils must have been a sore 
torment. Nature is merciless indeed. 
The next day we rode some sixteen miles to the 
beautiful hills of Kitanga, and for over a fortnight were 
either Pease’s guests at his farm—ranch, as we should 
call it in the West—or were on safari under his 
guidance. 
