GAME-PITS AGAIN. 
163 
across a long line of native game-pits near the river. 
Feeling too lazy to give these traps a wide berth, or to 
even dismount and lead the donkey, I tried to guide 
my animal between two of them; but a wilful donkey 
is no easy ship to steer, and when exactly between two 
pits he suddenly swerved towards the seemingly nice 
smooth path overlying one of their mouths. I jumped 
oft just in time to pull his head round, but not quickly 
enough to prevent his hind-legs dropping through the 
trap ; then I hung like “ grim death ” on to the rein and 
one stirrup-leather, and managed to keep him up till my 
gun-bearers arrived. We then hauled him out by the 
fore-legs after hitching the reins under his tail—a fortu¬ 
nate result of the accident, for had he gone to the bottom 
we should have been obliged to dig him out, as these 
game-pits were from eight to ten feet deop and scarcely 
three feet wide at the mouth. 
I found, on returning to camp, that C-had killed 
two Granti with fair horns, B-two rhinos, H_ 
three rhinos including a calf, and the first oryx-beisa. 
Phis is a beautiful antelope somewhat bigger than a 
red-deer, of a reddish-brown colour, with legs and head 
most prettily marked in black and white, a long tail 
bushy at the end, and straight slender horns, with a 
backward slant, annulated two-thirds from the base 
upwards. It was not a very good bull, as the horns 
were only twenty-two and twenty-four inches long re¬ 
spectively, and we afterwards got some with horns over 
thirty inches in length. Those of the cow are similar 
in form, but more slender, and it is a peculiarity with 
