“Very seldom. These two are particularly fleet, but I doubt whether they would have caught it. These deer can run for a long time, and although they will let dogs gain upon them they can leave them if they choose. Still I have known this couple run down a deer when they could not succeed in driving it within bowshot; but they know very well they ought not to do so, for, of course, deer are of no use for food unless the animals are properly killed and the blood allowed to escape.”
Several other stags were startled, but these all escaped, the dogs being too fatigued with their first run to be able to keep up with them. The other dogs were therefore unloosed and allowed to range about the country. They started several hyenas, some of which they themselves killed; others they brought to bay until the lads ran up and dispatched them with their arrows, while others which took to flight in sufficient time got safely away, for the hyena, unless overtaken just at the start, can run long and swiftly and tire out heavy dogs such as those the party had with them.
After walking some fifteen miles the lads stopped suddenly on the brow of a sandhill. In front of them was a wide expanse of water bordered by a band of vegetation. Long rushes and aquatic plants formed a band by the water’s edge, while here and there huts with patches of cultivated ground dotted the country.
“We are at the end of our journey,” Rabah said. “These huts are chiefly inhabited by fowlers and fishermen. We will encamp at the foot of this mound. It is better for us not to go too near the margin of the water, for the air is not salubrious to those unaccustomed to it. The best hunting ground lies a few miles to our left, for there, when the river is high, floods come down through a valley which is at all times wet and marshy. There we may expect to find game of all kinds in abundance.”
CHAPTER VI.
FOWLING AND FISHING.
The tents, which were made of light cloth intended to keep off the night dews rather than to afford warmth, were soon pitched, fires were lighted with fuel that had been brought with them in order to save time in searching for it, and Rabah went off to search for fish and fowl. He returned in half an hour with a peasant carrying four ducks and several fine fish.
“We shall do now,” he said; “with these and the stag our larder is complete. Everything but meat we have brought with us.”