“Well, I shall get one this time,” cried Jack, bringing his rifle to bear, and waiting for an opportunity as the beautiful animals galloped along; when a heavy beating noise behind him caught his ear, and turning he found that the gnus had also altered their course, and were coming back, with their heads down, tails up, and their horns half pointed, as if to charge the young hunter where he crouched.
There was no mistake about it; the gnu herd was coming straight for him, and in another minute they would have leaped down into the half dry watercourse, and trampled him into the sand.
It was a time for displaying a little presence of mind, and to show the power of man—in this case, boy—over the beasts of the field. If the gnus had kept on, they would have crushed Jack on the instant, each one being in strength much more than a match for a man; but on seeing him start up on one knee, and shout and wave his gun, they swerved off to the right, and thundered by, just as a lighter beating noise of feet was heard; and as Jack turned, there to his disgust was the last of the little herd of blessboks, almost close to him, galloping by.
Running round to the other side of the patch of grass he went down on one knee and fired; but the excitement had disarranged his nerves, and the bullet went over the last blessbok’s back; while before he could get in another cartridge and climb out of the watercourse, his chance was gone.
Chapter Twenty Five.
Nearly a Waggon-Wreck.
There were no temptations to tarry much upon these plains, where there were certainly plenty of antelopes, quagga, and zebras, but little else to interest them. Lions were pretty common, but somehow they did not trouble the travellers much, being pretty well supplied from the herds of antelopes and the like; but the hyaenas proved to be a perfect pest, howling about the cattle-kraal of a night, and harrying the oxen so that they could not rest in peace. Upon two successive nights it was hard work to save the cattle from making a regular stampede, for the poor creatures were so alarmed that they broke down the thorn fence and would have galloped over the plains but for the efforts and voices of their drivers and the Zulus.
So bad did the hyaenas become, that the first moonlight night it was resolved to lie in wait and try and shoot two or three.