Chap. XXVII. 
WOUNDED BUFFALO ASSISTED. 
545 
to be the cause of the elevation of tliis ridge, the direction in 
which the strike of the rocks trends to the N.N.E. may indicate 
that the same geological structoe prevails farther north, and 
two or three lakes which exist in that direction, may be of 
exactly the same nature with lake Ngami; having been dimi¬ 
nished to their present size by the same kind of agency as that 
which formed the falls of Victoria. 
We met an elephant on the Kalomo which had no tusks. This 
is as rare a tiling in Africa, as it is to find them with tusks in 
Ceylon. As soon as she saw us she made off It is remarkable 
to see the fear of man operatiug even on tliis huge beast. Buffa¬ 
loes abound, and we see large herds of them feediug in all dhec- 
tions by day. When much disturbed by man, they rethe into the 
densest parts of the forest, and feed by night only. We secured 
a fine large bull by crawling close to a herd: when shot, he feU 
down, and the rest, not seeing then enemy, gazed about, won¬ 
dering where the danger lay. The others came back to it, and, 
when we showed ourselves, much to the amusement of my com¬ 
panions, they hfted him up with their horns, and, half supporting 
him in the crowd, bore him away. All these wild animals usually 
gore a wounded companion and expel him from the herd; even 
zebras bite and lack an unfortunate or a diseased one. It is 
intended by tliis mstinct, that none but the perfect and healthy 
ones should propagate the species. In this case they manifested 
their usual propensity to gore the wounded, but our appearance at 
that moment caused them to take flight, and this, with the goring 
being continued a Little, gave my men the impression that they 
were helping away their wounded companion. He was shot 
between the fourth and fifth ribs; the ball passed through both 
lungs and a rib on the opposite side, and then lodged beneath the 
skin. But though it was two ounces in weight, yet he ran off 
some distance, and was secm’ed only by the people driving him 
into a pool of water and killing him there with then spears. 
The herd ran av/ay in the dhection of our camp, and then came 
bounding past us again. We took refuge on a large ant-hill, and 
as they rushed by us at fuU gallop, I had a good opportunity of 
seeing that the leader of a herd of about sixty, was an old cow; all 
the others allowed her a full half-length in then front. On her 
withers sat about twenty buffalo-birds (Textor erytJirorJiynchus, 
2 N 
