34 
SAVAGE SUDAN 
STALKING THE DESERT-GAZELLE 
Three Typical Examples from Diary 
(i) Fieldcraft comes in a Bad Second. —Have been in 
touch of game all day. Three separate troops have we 
courted—one of them twice ; yet sundown finds us empty- 
handed. True, the desert here is desperately flat; still 
after each failure a lurking- suspicion—at first latent-— 
finally enforced acceptance. The fault was mine, the old 
fault of impatience. On each crucial occasion we had 
essayed to “get in” too early, that is, before the psycho¬ 
logical moment had arrived. 
Luckily, after the final failure, I still lay flat, “pumped 
out,” indulging in posthumous wisdom and untimely 
regret. Right then, luck stepped in where fieldcraft and 
foresight had failed. Close by the disc of the half-sunk 
sun a figure breaks the horizon ... a tall camel, sur¬ 
mounted by an Arab . . . and there moves something 
between ? The afterglow obliterates detail, but soon 
that something resolves itself into a little string of 
disturbed gazelles. As the phantoms emerge in the 
clearer light to southward, I see there are six, all does ; 
then, ioo yards behind, follows a good buck. The light 
being faint for a moving shot, I whistled. Instantly the 
seven fairy forms became transfixed into images of bronze. 
The six leaders half-wheel, facing; but the one prize 
remains full broadside, taking his cue from his consorts : 
distance 120 yards. . . . Yes, quite a nice head, ioi inches. 
(ii) The Lesson Learnt. —Shortly after dawn sighted a 
dozen gazelle. The ground appeared open, but an hour’s 
watching revealed the fact that the game were feeding 
into a very slight undulation not before noticed. I now 
realised that this tiny dip ran straight ahead for a mile 
or so ; also that, parallel with it and 200 yards to the 
right, ran another low ridge crowned with scrub—a clear 
“advantage.” Sheltered by this, I had more than half 
