The Wildebeeste Is The Jekyll And Hyde Of The Animal Kingdom.
His
usual and familiar habit is that of a heavy, sluggish animal,
like our vanished bison.
He stands solid and inert, his head
down; he plods slowly forward in single file, his horns swinging,
each foot planted deliberately. In short, he is the
personification of dignity, solid respectability, gravity of
demeanour. But then all of a sudden, at any small interruption,
he becomes the giddiest of created beings. Up goes his head and
tail, he buck jumps, cavorts, gambols, kicks up his heels, bounds
stiff-legged, and generally performs like an irresponsible
infant. To see a whole herd at once of these grave and reverend
seigneurs suddenly blow up into such light-headed capers goes far
to destroy one's faith in the stability of institutions.
Also the wildebeeste is not misnamed. He is a conservative, and
he sees no particular reason for allowing his curiosity to
interfere with his preconceived beliefs. The latter are
distrustful. Therefore he and his females and his young-I should
say small-depart when one is yet far away. I say small, because
I do not believe that any wildebeeste is ever young. They do not
resemble calves, but are exact replicas of the big ones, just as
Niobe's daughters are in nothing childlike, but merely smaller
women.
When we caught sight of this lone wildebeeste among the zebra, I
naturally expected that we would pull up the buckboard, descend,
and approach to within some sort of long range. Then we would
open fire. Barring luck, the wildebeeste would thereupon depart
"wilder and beestier than ever," as John McCutcheon has it. Not at
all! Michael, the Hottentot, turned the buckboard off the road,
headed toward the distant quarry, and charged at full speed! Over
stones we went that sent us feet into the air, down and out of
shallow gullies that seemed as though they would jerk the pole
from the vehicle with a grand rattlety-bang, every one hanging on
for his life. I was entirely occupied with the state of my spinal
column and the retention of my teeth, but McMillan must have been
keeping his eye on the game. One peculiarity of the wildebeeste
is that he cannot see behind him, and another is that he is
curious. It would not require a very large bump of curiosity,
however, to cause any animal to wonder what all the row was
about. There could be no doubt that this animal would sooner or
later stop for an instant to look for the purpose of seeing what
was up in jungleland; and just before doing so he would, for a
few steps, slow down from a gallop to a trot. McMillan was
watching for this symptom.
"Now!" he yelled, when he saw it.
Instantly Michael threw his weight into the right rein and
against the brake. We swerved so violently to the right and
stopped so suddenly that I nearly landed on the broad prairies.
The manoeuvre fetched us up broadside.
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