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down the green banks of the lone Limpopo, where the mournful willows, stretching their long arms over the leaf-stained stream, 
form the most agreeable of canopies? through those shady labyrinths of sweet-smelling mimosas, ‘ringing with wood-notes wild’ 
—- whose fairy recesses, traversed by paths worn under the nocturnal tramp of Hippopotami, are bedizened with golden blossoms, 
and festooned with purple pods? From the branches of yonder tree which borders the stream, observe, suspended like a 
ripening gourd, the basket nest of the pensile grosbeak,* one of the little winged architects sitting snugly below in the porelt 
of its ‘tree-rocked cradle,’ which with no less industry than ingenuity it has woven of stout threads of the wire-grass. 
Mark ne well, within, without! 
No tool “had he that wrought, no knife to out, 
No ail to fix, no bodkin to insert, 
No glue to joins bis little benk was all; 
And ‘yet how nently finished! What nice hand, 
With every implement and meuns of art, 
Could compass such another? 
Now from behind the stems of that airy clump of mimosas, is thrust the long red and yellow phiz of an inquisitive 
Hartebeest, who has presently satisfied Ais suspicions, and cocking his black scut, is sweeping away with the easy motion of a 
rocking-horse. Ever and anon, as he scours through the grove, there issues from beneath the shelter of some mouldering 
trunk of drift wood— cast long since by the boiling flood upon the strand, and now matted over with clustering creepers, 
‘which hide the decay that works beneath—a troop of pearled Guinea piutados, whose cracked music resembles the grating of 
a hundred old doors upon their rusty hinges. And see, what strange trail is this? “Tis the recent and hurried tread of the 
gallant Water-Buck, broad and rounded at the point —the footsteps left by the ladies of his seraglio, being at once distinguish- 
able from his own by their taper toe, and more feminine proportions. Shy and politney, the herd, nine in number, must have 
taken the note of alarm from the hoarse eackle of those querulous birds, and are doubtless hurrying towards the river-brink— 
their sober colours enabling them to traverse the grove from end to end, without so much as a glimpse of their grey form 
being obtained. Ay, here is the harbour on which they have been lying for hours undisturbed —it is warm, and by their 
droppings absolutely tainted like a sheepfold. : , 
Adyaneing on the tracks, a more extended view of the river has opened upon us, and in that thorny vista, flapping his 
large round ears, and snufting restlessly about with wide distended nostrils, behold the wild desertlooking master buck, in 
propria persond, exhibiting all the self-importance of the grand Sultan in his harem. What a picturesque and noble beast it 
ist One of loftier mien, or more stately and gallant bearing, has never ranged the greenwood; and what a towering pair of 
horns too! “Aha,” he would seem to say, “I told you so—here’s the man with a gun”—wherenpon, suiting the action to 
the word, he places himself, like a great leader as he is, at the “head. of his confiding band, Obedient to the signal, they 
rush gallantly forward, sweep along the glade in glorious array, dash furiously down the steep bank, wnt? plunge at once 
right into the flashing waters of the Oori, Hark! how their hard hoofs clatter over the pebbly channel, as the bright 
ripples spread, and the white spray flies behind them! Already beyond their depth, they are stoutly breasting the current, 
their wet backs alternately rising on the surface, and again sinking beneath it, as the bubbling waters curl before their 
slim, but shaggy necks. Again they have found their footing, and one after the other, their stately forms are emerging to 
view. With that last brave bound, they have each gained the opposite bank, where, facmg about for a second, at the verge 
of the mimosa copse, and shaking the pearly drops from their dripping flanks, they stand majestically at gaze. Now for 
a steady hand and a true aim—another moment's pause, and, bang! the leaden sphere has spun from the deadly tube: 
Hark what loud. shouts 
Re-echo through the groves: 
The master buck has fallen with his bleeding nose betwixt his knees, and is ploughing up the yellow sand with his great 
horns ;— the savages, yelling with delight, are hurrying, assagai in hand, to despatch the struggling vietim;— whilst his 
bereaved and affrighted does, closely packed, are pressing forward, reeking and steaming, towards the nearest coyert! 
After erossing the Mariqua, I had been daily looking, with disappointed impatience, for the first glimpse of a Water- 
Buck, until late one evening, that we halted on the banks of the Bagobone river, in a lone* meadow, under a secondary 
range of the Cashan mountains. Our route had for some hours lain through a forest of ancient trees, some standing 
stately and dark in their foliage, others ‘riven and blasted by the storm, which had extended their bare arms across the 
path. But around our solitary bivouae, the scenery was of a wilder and even still more romantic character. On either 
hand the mountain rose *in bold majestic forms, clothed in parts with luxuriant verdure, whilst in others their steep rocky 
sides were only sparingly besprinkled with light bushes, serving to enliven the rich and varied tints of the broken crags. 
Rugged cliffs, which margined “the gurgling river, shut in the lower prospect, and the great range of the Cashan mountains 
towering above them in the distance, exhibited their spiry blue crests to eyes which had for months, over the ocean-like 
surface of the plain, beheld nothing larger than an ant-hill, and seemed almost to rival the Alps in grandeur. Our larder 
being quite empty, I left the Hottentots engaged in the construction of the usual thorn pound, for the better security of 
the cattle; and taking my rifle, dived into the unfrequented recesses of the nearest grove, for the purpose of obtaining « 
supply of wild-flesh, Ere I had proceeded many yards, a stately figure, which T at once recognized to belong to the 
Water-Buck, emerging with slow and measured pace, placed itself directly across my path, and having received a ball through 
¥ Loxia pensilis. . 
