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He was lying down, and his nose rested against the earth just like a very old family horse in a paddock. Besides these common species were bush-buck wart-hog, lesser kudu, giraffe, and leopard. The bush-buck we jumped occasionally quite near at hand. They ducked their heads low and rushed tearingly to the next cover.
On the alert, I stopped instantly, and the next moment was rewarded by seeing a splendid bush-buck advance from the water in a most stately manner. I could only make out his head and neck above the undergrowth, but as he was only some fifty yards off, I raised my rifle to my shoulder to fire.
The Bay bush-buck and Bay bush-goat are two species described as natives of Sierra Leone; while the Black bush-boc, of a sooty black colour, is found on the coast of Guinea. The Coquetoon is a species of a deep-reddish bay colour, belonging to Western Africa; and on the Senegal and Gambia we meet with another sooty species, called the Guevei.
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.
Like the lion, however, it was more frightened than we, and charged away from us through the jungle. For about two hours we pursued our journey into the plateau, and saw and heard a wonderful variety of game, including giraffe, rhino, bush-buck, the lesser kudu, zebra, wart-hog, baboons and monkeys, and any number of paa, the last being of a redder colour than those of the Tsavo valley.
As he stood looking, some one called out, "There he is!" The wretched man then realised his situation. His first impulse was to fly all the savage in him prompting towards an escape into the bush, which lay temptingly near. He sprang back and ran fleet as a bush-buck towards the cover.
He must abstain from many foods, such as eggs, birds of all sorts, mutton, dog, bush-buck, and so forth. He may neither wear nor touch a mask, and no masked man may enter his house. If a dog enters his house, it is killed and thrown out. As priest of the Earth he may not sit on the bare ground, nor eat things that have fallen on the ground, nor may earth be thrown at him.
This sounded reasonable; in fact, it was still reasonable. The grass was here fairly neck high, and we found a rain-filled water-hole. Therefore we decided to make camp. C. and I wandered out in search of game. We tramped a great deal of bold, rugged country, both in cañon bottoms and along the open ridges, but found only a rhinoceros, one bush-buck and a dozen hartebeeste.
The jackal scuttled down to the river to have a drink, which he got rather riskily among the horns of drinking, congregated hartebeests, impala, and other antelope, and returned with the leg-bone of a bush-buck, which had been slain the night before by a leopard, and he went to ground very quickly, for the great spotted cat could be heard, grunting wrath, at his heels.
"If mother is to get her meat to-day," said Ralph at length, "I think that we must try the hill side for a duiker or a bush-buck." So they turned inland and rode towards that very kloof where years before Suzanne had discovered the shipwrecked boy. At the mouth of this kloof was a patch of marshy ground, where the reeds still stood thick, since being full of sap they had resisted the fire.
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