By nightfall we were glad that the long dusty day of ceremony was over, and next morning, when a number of Rer Harún horsemen arrived and asked to be allowed to repeat the show, we found ourselves obliged to decline the honour, and continued our survey westward towards the Abyssinian border.
Our men, on the night of the Rer Ali dibáltig, went to the karias and danced till nearly daylight, the women clapping their hands and jumping up and down, keeping up a monotonous refrain. Next day half our men were ill, having gorged themselves upon the mutton and camel meat which had been generously provided by the Rer Ali.
We passed the deserted village of Dagahbúr and reached a rounded grassy hill called Túli, and it was while encamped here that we shot the first Somáli rhinoceros, an animal which for many years we had expected to come upon, but which up till then had never been seen or shot by an European. We found plenty of game at Túli, and as I rode up to the rounded hill to choose a site for my camp, a troop of ostriches went racing away into the sea of bush and grass to the north-west.
To the west of Gumbur Túli lay a valley covered with dense dark mimósa forest, called Dih Wiyileh,[29] or Rhinoceros Valley. Between Dagahbúr and Waror, an interval of fifty miles, the country was waterless at this season, and hearing that Waror was occupied by Abyssinian soldiers, I deemed it advisable to arrive there with a supply of water on the camels; so finding the háns rather low, I had to wait at Túli a couple of days while we sent back to Dagahbúr for more water.
The time had come when I hoped to make the acquaintance of the long-sought rhinoceroses; and I left camp in the early morning with my two gunbearers Géli and Hassan, and another man called Au Ismail, who led our one camel and acted as guide.
Taking a line to the south-west across the Dih Wiyileh from Túli Hill, we presently came on fresh rhinoceros signs. These we took up till nearly midday, the two beasts we were following having made a maze of tracks there while feeding in the morning. At last Géli pointed to our game—two rhinoceroses standing, apparently asleep, under a shady thorn bush. I advanced to forty yards, and opened fire with the four-bore, putting a four-ounce bullet into the shoulder of each with a right and left, making them tear away at a gallop through the jungle. I followed at best pace, putting in two more cartridges as I ran, and so finishing one of the rhinos. Passing this one, I found the other standing in thick bush broadside on, listening and looking for its fellow. Feeling for cartridges, I put my hand into empty pockets, the rest having fallen out in my haste, so I ran back to the camel to snatch more out of a haversack. Au Ismail saw me running back away from the rhinoceros, and jumped to the conclusion that I was running away! So he began to bolt with the camel. I ran harder and harder, shouting to him to stop, and at last I got hold of him and explained what I wanted. Then, rearmed, I returned to the rhinoceros, which had been standing meanwhile in the same place, apparently unable to make out what I was about, and too sick to charge. Another shot finished it. Unfortunately they were both cows, but I was very pleased at the result of my first rhino hunt.
A trial of strength
I returned with the two heads to camp, and sent half a dozen men to cut off the shields, of which we obtained thirty-five from the two skins. These men arrived in camp next morning, and said that while they had been cutting up the rhinos by the light of torches, several more had come round them, and a lion had roared to the westward.