128 
SAVAGE SUDAN 
bethought ourselves of a plan to get rid of these super¬ 
fluous friends, and presently sat down to explain it. 
Much palaver flowed ere the scheme dawned on their 
minds; then, having sorted out the savages into con¬ 
venient groups, I instructed them to set out separately, 
each party scouting for game in certain specified direc¬ 
tions^—which, however, excluded the windward. Upon 
finding game, they were instructed to return and report to 
us at the spot where we then sat. Ten minutes later, so 
soon as all their gangs were well out of sight in the thick 
bush, we proceeded alone, upwind, and, after a while, felt 
assured that our plan had succeeded. 
Several hours had elapsed when, among rather open 
bush, we descried a herd of thirty waterbuck which at 
once struck us both as being totally different from any 
we had ever seen before. They were all of a light rufous 
fawn-colour, which at once reminded me of the plate 
entitled “ Cobus defassaf in The Book of Antelopes 
(vol. ii., p. 115), the accuracy of which plate I had 
myself questioned (as regards colour only) in my On 
Safari , p. 24. 
The herd now before us was chiefly composed of 
females and small beasts, but included five bulls, one 
conspicuously finer than his colleagues—in fact, quite a 
warrantable specimen. Him I resolved to possess, 
tempted thereto by his wholly unusual colour and by 
the desire to settle once for all (at least in my own 
mind) any question of racial distinctions among these 
waterbuck of the Sudan. The stalk itself presented no 
special difficulty, the deep grass being nicely studded 
with trees, and succeeded all right. 
At little over 100 yards my bullet had taken the 
bull quite fair on the shoulder — a blow that in nine 
cases out of ten signifies instant death ; yet the stricken 
beast merely moved a step or two forward and stood, 
head down, beneath a tree. While debating in my mind 
whether another shot was needed . . . suddenly, from 
