I Believed I Missed It, As I Fired A Quick Shot Just As It Disappeared In The Thick Bushes.

Whistling for my people, I was now joined by Bacheet and Richarn, my other men remaining with the giraffe.

For about four miles we followed on the track through the broken valley of the Atbara, during which we several times disturbed the tetel, but could not obtain a good shot, on account of the high grass and thick bushes. Several times I tried a snap shot, as for a moment I caught sight of its red hide galloping through the bush, but as it ran down wind I had no chance of getting close to my game. At length, after following rapidly down a grassy ravine, I presently heard it pelting through the bushes; the ravine made a bend to the right, therefore, by taking a short cut, I arrived just in time to catch sight of the tetel as it passed over an open space below me; this time the little Fletcher bagged him. On examination I found that I had struck it four times. I had fired five shots, but as three of those had been fired almost at random, when the animal was in full speed through the bushes, one had missed, and the others were badly placed.

"Fortunately this long hunt had been in the direction of Sofi, to which we were near; still more fortunately, after we had marked the spot, we shortly met my first party of Arabs returning towards the village, heavily laden with giraffe's flesh, and the hide of one that I had killed yesterday. It appeared that during the night, lions and hyaenas had completely devoured one of the giraffes, not even leaving a vestige of skin or bone, but the immediate neighbourhood of the spot where it lay had been trampled into mud by the savage crowd who had left their footprints as witnesses to the robbery; the hide and bones had evidently been dragged away piecemeal.

"On arrival at the river we were all busy in preparing for the passage with so large a quantity of meat. The water-skins for the raft were quickly inflated, and I learnt from the Arabs an excellent contrivance for carrying a quantity of flesh across a river, without its becoming sodden. The skin of the tetel was nearly as capacious as that of an Alderney cow; this had been drawn off in the usual manner, so as to form a sack. The Arabs immediately proceeded to tie up the neck like the mouth of a bag, and to secure the apertures at the knees in like manner; when this operation was concluded, the skin became an immense sack, the mouth being at the aperture left at the hind-quarters. The No. 10 bullet had gone completely through the shoulders of the tetel, thus the two holes in the hide required stopping; this was dexterously performed by inserting a stone into either hole, of a size so much larger than the aperture, that it was impossible to squeeze them through.

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