Hunters three: Sport and adventure in South Africa

by Thomas Wallace Knox

By the time we got back to camp it was past noon, and we were, literally, hungry as hunters. The cook was ready for us with a dinner of gemsbok-steak and stewed rhinoceros. Rhinoceros is not by any means a bad dish, and many is the meal I have made of it. You can have it in a steak, a roast, or a stew. I think it goes best in a stew; but there is a difference of opinion on that point, just as there is in everything else in the cooking line. A young elephant is not at all bad eating, and elephants' feet, no matter whether the animal be young or old, are one of the delicacies of Africa.

To cook an elephant's foot, and do it properly, requires time and attention. First get your foot. Then dig a hole in the ground and build a fire over it; keep this fire going for two or three hours, until you have got the ground hot all around, and the hole is filled with coals and glowing ashes. Then throw your elephant's foot into the hole, covering it over with the hot ashes and embers, and build more fire over it. It will take from one hour to five or six hours to cook the foot, depending upon its size and the extent and heat of the fire. When you think it is done let it stay a little longer—say half an hour—then rake it out of the ashes, and after letting it cool enough so that you can handle it, serve it up. It will be found to be a delicious semi-gelatinous mass, suggesting broiled pigs' feet, but as much better than that commonplace dish as the elephant is nobler and larger than our bristly friend of the pigsty.

While at dinner we discussed various things to do in the afternoon, but found that all were sufficiently weary after the morning's work to be willing to keep quiet the rest of the day. At the same time we wanted to do something, and so it was proposed that we go down to the river—about two miles—and try for a hippopotamus. The hippo is a difficult beast to shoot, as he sticks pretty closely to the water, and it is very unusual to find him on land. The time he spends out of the water is nearly always at night. The natives take advantage of this peculiarity of the beast, and make traps and pitfalls for him; and that reminds me that I came very near getting my death-blow from a hippopotamus-trap, one afternoon, while I was walking along a path near the river-bank. This is the way the thing was rigged:

An iron spear was stuck in the end of a heavy stick of wood; and as if the weight of the stick was not enough, some heavy stones were tied on each side of it, close to the end. This spear was suspended, with the point downward, right above a path which the hippopotamus followed on the way from the river to his feeding-ground. The cord by which the spear was suspended was carried over the limb of a tree and then down to the ground, where it was fastened to a trigger. This trigger was connected with a cord that extended across the path.

Now, a hippopotamus, in coming along the path, does not try to step over the cord, but pushes his clumsy feet against it. In the first place, he is taking his walk at night, and cannot see the cord; and even if he could see it his legs are too short to allow him to step over it. So he just shuffles along, pushes against it, releases the trigger, and if the trap has been properly arranged the spear comes down directly between his shoulders; his spine is pretty certainly cut in two, and if he is not killed outright he is unable to leave the spot. The natives find him in the morning, and despatch him very quickly if any life remains.

I had heard about these traps before I came into the hippopotamus region, but had forgotten all about them, when one day I was walking along a path and came to a cord just such as I have described. It was rather high for me to step over, and the thought occurred to me that somebody must have lost a piece of cord there and I had better pick it up. I was extending my hand to take hold of it when I happened to look upward, and saw, directly above me, the weighted spear, ready to fall the instant the trigger was disturbed! I backed away from the spot very quickly, and took a course around the trap instead of venturing farther along the path.

Harry and Jack were ready for the hippopotamus-hunt before I was, and they started off, I agreeing to follow. They had previously sent away a dozen or more natives—some of them our own men, and others picked up in the vicinity—to prepare the raft necessary for a raid upon the amphibious brutes. It is better to shoot them from a raft of reeds—which can be constructed in a few minutes—than to shoot them from a boat. They can overturn a boat and make it decidedly nasty for the occupants; it is true they can shake up a raft somewhat, but they cannot overturn it or sink it anywhere near as easily as they can a boat.

My friends had been gone ten or fifteen minutes, and I was just getting ready to start, when Mirogo, my elephant-tracker, came rushing in, and said there were elephants back in the forest where we had shot them in the morning.

Here was a temptation that I could not well resist. Elephants are bigger game than hippopotami, and there is a great deal more glory, and also a good deal more risk, in shooting them. I started a man off to tell Harry and Jack to go ahead with their fun and not wait for me, and also to inform them as to the cause of my detention.

Well, we went after the elephants—Mirogo, Kalil, and I. This time I put my large cartridge-belt around my waist—I had worn my small one before—and as we neared the forest I filled it with cartridges from the supply which Kalil carried.