334 TO THE UASIN G1SHU [ch. xii 
Game abounded on the plains. We saw a couple of 
herds of giraffes. The hartebeests were the most 
plentiful and the least shy; time after time a small 
herd loitered until we were within a hundred yards 
before cantering away. Once or twice we saw topi 
among them; and often there were mixed herds of 
zebras and hartebeests. Oribi were common, and some¬ 
times uttered a peculiar squealing whistle when they 
first saw us. The reedbuck also whistled, but their 
whistle was entirely distinct. It was astonishing how 
close the reedbuck lay. Again and again we put them 
up within a few feet of us from patches of reeds or 
hollows in the long grass. A much more singular 
habit is the way in which they share these retreats with 
dangerous wild beasts—a trait common also to the 
cover-loving bushbuck. From one of the patches of 
reeds in which Kermit and 1 shot two hyenas a reed¬ 
buck doe immediately afterward took flight. She had 
been reposing peacefully during the day within fifty 
j^ards of several hyenas! Tarlton had more than once 
found both reedbuck and bushbuck in comparatively 
small patches of cover which also held lions. 
It is, by the way, a little difficult to know what 
names to use in distinguishing between the sexes of 
African game. The trouble is one which obtains in 
all new countries, where the settlers have to name new 
beasts, and is, of course, primarily due to the fact 
that the terms already found in the language originally 
applied only to domestic animals and to European 
beasts of the chase. Africanders, whether Dutch or 
English, speak of all antelope, of either sex, as “buck.” 
Then they call the males and females of the larger kinds 
bulls and cows, just as Americans do when they speak 
of moose, wapiti, and caribou , and the males and females 
