88 
RHINO AND GIRAFFES [ch. iv 
heads were curiously shaved, so that the hair-tufts stood 
out in odd patterns ; and they carried small bows, and 
arrows with poisoned heads. 
The following morning I rode out with Captain 
Slatter. We kept among the hills. The long drought 
was still unbroken. The little pools were dry and their 
bottoms baked like iron, and there was not a drop in 
the watercourses. Fart of the land was open, and part 
covered with a thin forest or bush of scattered mimosa- 
trees. In the open country were many zebras and 
hartebeests, and the latter were found even in the thin 
bush. In the morning we found a small herd of eland, 
at which, after some stalking, I got a long shot and 
missed. The eland is the largest of all the horned 
creatures that are called antelope, being quite as heavy 
as a fattened ox. The herd I approached consisted of 
a dozen individuals, two of them huge bulls, their coats 
having turned a slaty blue, their great dewlaps hanging 
down, and the legs looking almost too small for the 
massive bodies. The reddish-coloured cows were of far 
lighter build. Eland are beautiful creatures, and ought 
to be domesticated. As I crept toward them I was 
struck by their likeness to great clean, handsome cattle. 
They were grazing or resting, switching their long tails 
at the flies that hung in attendance upon them and lit 
on their flanks, just as if they were Jerseys in a field at 
home. My bullet fell short, their size causing me to 
underestimate the distance, and away they went at a 
run, one or two of the cows in the first hurry and con¬ 
fusion skipping clean over the backs of others that got 
in their way—a most unexpected example of agility in 
such large and ponderous animals. After a few hundred 
yards they settled down to the slashing trot which is 
their natural gait, and disappeared over the brow of a hill. 
