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The idea of her son being an attendant of Warwick Sahib, not to mention a hunter of tigers, was only a tale to tell her husband when the boy's bright eyes were closed in sleep. "Nay, little man," she told him. "Would I want thee torn to pieces in Nahara's claws? Would I want thee smelling of the jungle again, as thou didst after chasing the water-buck through the bamboos?
Although they had performed a long and rough day's journey, they sat up round the fire late into the night, cooking and eating the rhinoceros and water-buck flesh, and relating to each other their oft-told adventures.
I think I have said that we had put a roast quarter of water-buck into the canoe. Well, it so happened that when we all prostrated ourselves to avoid being swept out of the boat and into the water by the rock roof, Umslopogaas's head had come down uncommonly near this roast buck, and so soon as he had recovered a little from the first shock of our position it occurred to him that he was hungry.
From my perch among the branches I watched first a water-buck come to drink in the river; then a bush-buck; later, a tiny paa emerged from the bushes and paused at every step with one graceful forefoot poised in the air thoroughly on the alert and looking round carefully and nervously for any trace of a possible enemy. At length it reached the brink of the river in safety, and stooped to drink.
The water-buck came here in herds from the elephant country away south, beyond the hour-glass-like constriction which divided the great forest, and the tiny dik-dik, smallest of all antelopes, came also to take its sip. But all that is past.
The Mehedehet is an antelope of great beauty; it resembles the red deer in colour, but the coat is still rougher; it stands about thirteen hands in height, with a pair of long slightly-curved annulated horns. This antelope is the "water-buck" of South Africa.
Stanley was very full of his trip, for Carew had readily given him the two or three days' leave; and in the direction whither they journeyed were roan and sable and water-buck and probably lions to rejoice the heart of a game young British South African policeman with a bloodthirsty desire to kill.
Every now and again, also, we caught glimpses of startled bush-buck and water-buck, while occasionally the sound of a splash in the water told of a wary crocodile.
Our progress was now easy, and the track led through fairly open glades where traces of bush-buck and water-buck were numerous; indeed once or twice we caught glimpses of these animals as they bounded away to the shelter of the thicket, warned by the sound of our approach.
The hunters had not gone far, when, as they were skirting the thicket, they came on a small herd of water-buck. The trader, raising his rifle, fired, and one of the graceful animals lay struggling on the grass. The rest bounded off like lightning, to escape the shot which the native discharged. Both hurrying forward, soon put the deer out of its misery.
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