666 
African Game Trails 
As soon as I reached the hill-crest I saw the 
giraffes ahead of me, not as far off as I had 
feared, and I raced toward them without 
regard to rotten ground and wart-hog holes. 
The wounded one lagged behind, but when 
I got near he put on a spurt, and as I thought 
I was close enough I leaped off, throwing 
the reins over the sorrel’s head, and opened 
fire. Down went the big bull, and I thought 
my task was done. But as I went back to 
mount the sorrel he struggled to his feet 
again and disappeared after his compan- 
of my prize. In a few minutes Captain 
Slatter loped up, and the gun-bearers and 
saises followed, As if by magic, three or 
four Wkamba turned up immediately after¬ 
ward, their eyes glistening at the thought 
of the feast ahead for the whole tribe. It 
was mid-afternoon, and there was no time 
to waste. My sais, Simba, an excellent 
long-distance runner, was sent straight to 
camp to get Heller and pilot him back to the 
dead giraffes. Beside each of the latter, for 
they had fallen a mile apart, we left a couple 
The Percival family. 
From a photograph by Edmund Heller. 
ions among the trees, which were thicker 
here, as we had reached the bottom of the 
valley. So I tore after him again, and in a 
minute came to a dry water-course. Scramb¬ 
ling into and out of this I saw the giraffes 
ahead of me just beginning the ascent of 
the opposite slope; and touching the horse 
with the spur we flew after the wounded 
bull. This time I made up my mind I 
would get up close enough; but Tranquillity 
did not quite like the look of the thing 
ahead of him. He did not refuse to come 
up to the giraffe, but he evidently felt that, 
with such an object close by and evident in 
the landscape, it behooved him to be care¬ 
ful as to what might be hidden therein, and 
he shied so at each bush we passed that 
we progressed in series of loops. So off I 
jumped, throwing the reins over his head, 
and opened fire once more; and this time 
the great bull went down for good. 
Tranquillity recovered his nerve at once 
and grazed contentedly while I admired 
the huge proportions and beautiful coloring 
of men to build fires. Then we rode toward 
camp. To my regret, the smaller giraffe 
turned out to be a young bull and not a cow. 
At this very time, and utterly without our 
knowledge, there was another giraffe hunt 
going on. Sir Alfred had taken out Ker- 
mit and Medlicott, and they came across 
a herd of a dozen giraffes right out in the 
open plains. Medlicott’s horse was worn 
out and he could not keep up, but both 
the others were fairly well mounted. Both 
were light men and hard riders, and al¬ 
though the giraffes had three-quarters of a 
mile start, it was not long before both were 
at the heels of the herd. They singled out 
the big bull, which by the way turned out 
to be an even bigger bull than mine, and 
fired at him as they galloped. In such a 
headlong helter-skelter chase, however, it is 
no easy matter to score a hit from horseback 
unless one is very close up; and Sir Alfred 
made up his mind to try to drive out the 
bull from the rest of the herd. He suc¬ 
ceeded; but at this moment his horse put 
