with the instinct of a monkey, made a violent spring and
swung himself by a bough immediately over the beast,
whilst Faraj bolted away and left me single-gunned to
polish him off. There was only one course to pursue,
for in one instant more he would have been into me;
so, quick as thought, I fired the gun, and, as luck would
have it, my bullet, after passing through the edge of one
of his horns, stuck in the spine of his neck, and rolled
him over at my feet as dead as a rabbit. Now, having
cut the beast’s throat to make him “ hilal,” according to
Mussulman usage, and thinking we had done enough if I
could only return to the first wounded bull and settle him
too, we commenced retracing our steps, and by accident
came on Grant. He was passing by from another quarter,
and became amused by the glowing description of my boys,
who never omitted to narrate their own cowardice as an
excellent tale. He begged us to go on in our course,
whilst he would go back and send us some porters to
carry home the game.
Now, tracking back again to the first point of attack,
we followed the blood of the first bull, till at length I
found him standing like a stuck pig in some bushes,
looking as if he would like to be put out of his miseries.
Taking compassion, I levelled my Blissett j but, as bad
luck would have it, a bough intercepted the flight of the
bullet, and it went “ pinging” into the air, whilst the big
bull went off at a gallop. To follow on was no difficulty,
the spoor was so good; and in ten minutes more, as I
opened on a small clearance, Blissett in hand, the great
beast, from the thicket on the opposite side, charged down
like a mad bull, full of ferocity—as ugly an antagonist as
ever I saw, for the front of his head was all shielded with
horn. A small mound fortunately stood between us, and
as he rounded it, I jumped to one side and let fly at his
flank, but without the effect of stopping him; for, as
quick as thought, the huge monster was at my feet,