African Game Trails 
mals while the rest of us pushed wherever 
we wished after the big game. The tents 
were pitched, and the ox-wagons drawn up 
on the southern side of the muddy river, by 
the edge of a wide plain, on which we could 
see the game grazing as we walked around 
camp. The alluvial flats bordering the river, 
and some of the higher plains, were covered 
with an open forest growth, the most com¬ 
mon tree looking exactly like a giant sage¬ 
brush, thirty feet high; and there were tall 
aloes and cactus and flat-topped mimosa. 
for the gaudy flowers of the tall mint which 
grew close to the river. We got a small co¬ 
bra, less than eighteen inches long; it had 
swallowed another snake almost as big as 
itself; unfortunately the head of the swal¬ 
lowed snake was digested, but the body 
looked like that of a young puff-adder. 
The day after reaching this camp I rode 
off for a hunt, accompanied by my two gun- 
bearers and with a dozen porters following, 
to handle whatever I killed. One of my 
original gun-bearers, Mahomet, though a 
We found a wee hedgehog, with much white 
about it. He would cuddle up in my hand 
snuffing busily with his funny little nose. 
We did not have the heart to turn the tame, 
friendly little fellow over to the naturalists, 
and so we let him go. Birds abounded. 
One kind of cuckoo called like a whippoor¬ 
will in the early morning and late evening, 
and after nightfall. Among our friendly vis¬ 
itors were the pretty, rather strikingly col¬ 
ored little chats—Livingstone’s wheatear— 
which showed real curiosity in coming into 
camp. They were nesting in burrows on 
the open plains round about. Mearns got 
a white egg and a nest at the end of a little 
burrow two feet long; wounded, the birds 
ran into holes or burrows. They sang at¬ 
tractively on the wing, often at night. The 
plover-like coursers, very pretty birds, con¬ 
tinually circled round us with querulous 
clamor. Gorgeously colored, diminutive 
sunbirds, of many different kinds, were 
abundant; they had an especial fondness 
good man in the field, had proved in other 
respects so unsatisfactory that he had been 
replaced by another, a Wkamba heathen 
named Gouvinali—I could never remember 
his name until, as a mnemonic aid, Kermit 
suggested that I think of Gouverneur Mor¬ 
ris, the old Federalist statesman, whose life I 
had once studied. He was a capital man 
for the work. 
Half a mile from camp I saw a buck 
tommy with a good head, and as we needed 
his delicious venison for our own table, I 
dismounted and after a little care killed him 
as he faced me at two hundred and ten 
yards. Sending him back by one of the 
porters, I rode on toward two topi we saw 
far in front. But there were zebra, harte- 
beest, and wildebeest in between, all of 
which ran; and the topi proved wary. I 
was still walking after them when we made 
out two eland bulls ahead and to our left. 
The ground was too open to admit of the 
possibility of a stalk; but leaving my horse 
