Jan. 5.—We got up rather late the next morning, and H. went out shooting. I said I would stay in camp and receive Kirkham when he came, but he did not arrive after all till the afternoon; so, having waited for him until twelve, I decided to go out shooting. I proceeded down to the watercourse, and had not gone far before I came to a pool, at which some pigs were about to drink; I tried to stalk them, but they trotted away. I then turned sharp to the left into the jungle, and wandered about some little time. One could not well imagine a more likely place for wild game, and I expected every moment to see some strange animal dart out of the bushes.
The air was very hot. I had walked about an hour and a half, and I determined to rest and eat some sardines and a crust of bread which I had brought with me. I got on the top of a little mound, and was discussing my luncheon, when I heard a sort of sneezing noise behind me. This made me prick up my ears; I looked round and saw walking quietly out a beautiful little male dik-dik. I rolled him over with my shot gun, pulled out my knife and rushed after him. He was struggling and bounding about on the ground when I got up to him, when I made several vigorous stabs at him with my knife, but, to my great chagrin, he scampered away. I ran after him, getting well torn by the bushes, and found him lying dead just at the foot of a thorny bush. This was the first African animal I shot, and, although he was so small, I felt as proud of him as a cat would with her first mouse.
At the time the dik-dik came out I heard pigs grunting in a little dell below me, but I could not see them at all. I went back to camp, and hearing that Kirkham was up in the missionaries' house I sent word to him that I had come in. I was sitting in the tent when suddenly I saw a fair, rather good-looking, slim man walking up to me; he was dressed in a frock-coat and forage cap—a sort of undress general's uniform. It had a very strange effect to see this man walk up to one in an African jungle—his dress, too, not such as one would expect to see in those parts.
We soon became the best of friends. He told me he would do everything in his power to get us shooting, and forward us through the country. We had a very pleasant little dinner in the tent, talking over our prospects; Kirkham said he would breakfast with us next morning, and then go on to Gindar. At this place he has built a sort of wooden shanty; he had also brought his tent with him to make arrangements for us. He was attended by an Abyssinian servant, named Peter Brou, a man who had been educated at Malta; this man spoke English very well, and could also speak Amharic, all the Abyssinian dialects, and Arabic. Kirkham recommended us to take him as our servant, which we did; he turned out very useful, and was one of the best interpreters I ever knew.
Jan. 6.—After breakfast, and when Kirkham had left us, the weather having cleared up, I went out shooting, and walked through the jungle down to the village of Ailet. The boy who was with me was an Abyssinian Mussulman, living at Massowah, but he seemed to know all the Shoho Arabs in the village. I went into a house to look at the interior and see what it was like; it was an oblong structure built of grass, divided by a grass screen into two chambers, the door of the screen being covered by an Arab cloth. The Arab women, who were grinding corn, amused themselves by peeping at me through the ragged holes in the cloth; they were very civil, and brought me a cup of coffee. I ate my lunch and then started with two of the boys of the village, sent by their father to show me the place where I might find "pig." I did not see anything, but my Massowah boy annoyed me very much by coolly firing at some guinea-fowl with my 16-bore gun loaded with ball, so I told him that the next time he did that I should give him a good thrashing.
I then walked on towards the little stream running from the hot springs, rather disappointed and tired. Going through the jungle I put up a dik-dik hind; this animal trotted away out of shot range, and then stopped and looked at me. I had read in some book of African sport that the curiosity of deer is extraordinary, so I squatted down and twirled my gun about much in the same way as signallers do with a signal flag. To my great astonishment the little dik-dik pricked up her ears, and gradually making little circuits approached within range; it seemed almost a pity to shoot so pretty a little animal, but I fired and rolled her over.
On my way towards home I heard in the jungle some people chattering; they were the women of the village of Ailet, gathering and cutting firewood. I was walking on when two very pretty and gracefully-shaped girls stepped out from the bushes; they were stripped to their waists in order to work more easily. Mahomed, the Massowah boy, seemed to know them, for both of them came smiling up to him, saying, "Ah, Mahomed, how are you?" and he kissed them both. This young gentleman seems to be quite a Lothario, and knows all the girls about here. When the ceremony of kissing was over the girls saw me for the first time, and retreated like two startled gazelles.
Dik-dik flesh is very good eating; it tastes better roasted when one has bacon to add to it. The best way to cook the haunch is to lard it well with bacon fat and then roast it in Turkish fashion, skewered through with a stick.
The above applies to gazelles as well, as these animals have no fat except round their kidneys. This is also the best way to cook all birds, but the larding may be omitted.
Jan. 7.—This morning, having bade adieu to the missionaries, we started for Gindar by a short cut across the hills. The missionaries are making this road, but the jungle is not all cut yet. Our guide was Brou, the interpreter that Kirkham had given us as a servant.