142 
A BUFFALO HUNT 
[CH. VI 
It grows up the mahogo as a vine, and gradually, by 
branching, and by the spreading of the branches, com¬ 
pletely envelops the trunk, and also grows along each 
limb, and sends out great limbs of its own. Every 
stage can be seen, from that in which the big vine has 
begun to grow up along the still flourishing mahogo, 
through that in which the tree looks like a curious 
composite, the limbs and thick foliage of the fig branch¬ 
ing out among the limbs and scanty foliage of the still 
living mahogo, to the stage in which the mahogo is 
simply a dead skeleton seen here and there through the 
trunk or the foliage of the fig. Finally nothing remains 
but the fig, which grows to be a huge tree. 
Heatley’s house was charming, with its vine-shaded 
veranda, its summer-house and out-buildings, and the 
great trees clustered round about. He was fond of 
sport in the right way—that is, he treated it as sport 
and not business, and did not allow it to interfere with 
his prime work of being a successful farmer. He had 
big stock-yards for his cattle and swine, and he was 
growing all kinds of things of both the temperate and 
the tropic zones—wheat and apples, coffee and sugar¬ 
cane. The bread we ate and the coffee we drank were 
made from what he had grown on his own farm. 
There were roses in the garden and great bushes of 
heliotrope by the veranda, and the drive to his place 
was bordered by trees from Australia and beds of native 
flowers. 
Next day we went into Nairobi, where we spent a 
most busy week, especially the three naturalists; for 
the task of getting into shape for shipment, and then 
shipping, the many hundreds of specimens—indeed, all 
told, there were thousands of specimens—was of Hercu¬ 
lean proportions. Governor Jackson—a devoted orni- 
