Hunters three: Sport and adventure in South Africa

by Thomas Wallace Knox

"A minute more," said Jack—"yes, half a minute—and you would have been in the jaws of a crocodile!"

I felt my hair standing on end at this announcement, which I could not fully comprehend; and I replied to it with the question, "What do you mean?"

"I mean just this," said Jack: "when we came in sight of you we saw from your position that you had probably fallen asleep. As we came nearer we saw that the river in front of you was full of crocodiles; there must have been a dozen of them close to you, and a dozen more only a little distance away. They probably stopped at first to look at you out of curiosity, and then made up their minds that you would be good to eat. We saw two or three of them creeping up in your direction, and the foremost of the lot had his nose within less than a yard of your feet. We could see that he was preparing to seize you. Others were moving along in his direction, and the probabilities are that when one of them had grabbed you and pulled you into the water the others would have taken a share in the work. We fired at one of them, but not the one nearest you, for fear that in his sudden whirling about he would sweep you into the water. Immediately after firing we shouted, and the shouts and the report of the rifle drove the crocodiles away."

I then realized the dangerous position in which I had been, and made a vow never to run the same risk again. I kept that vow faithfully for a week, when I was one day out duck-shooting, and had ornamented my belt with five or six ducks. I wanted to cross the river where the water was not very deep, and thought I could do so with safety. I started in, the ducks hanging at my side, and I holding my gun between my chin and chest so as to keep it from getting wet. The water was very nearly at my neck, and I was getting slowly along, when suddenly I saw a crocodile—an immense fellow—coming in my direction like a steamboat, not twenty yards away, his ugly snout protruding from the water.

I dropped my gun instantly, and struck out with both hands for the shore. Partly swimming and partly wading, I reached it, and got on dry land with the monster's nose about six feet behind me! That was about as close a call as the other one.

I was quite alone, and there was no way in which I could recover my gun without an almost certain risk of becoming the prey of the crocodiles. The next day all hands of us went there, and by keeping up a great noise we drove the saurians out of the way, and got a chance to drag for the gun. We worked there two or three hours, and finally recovered it. The reader may ask why we did not dive for it; but I beg him to remember that the proximity of crocodiles or alligators is not encouraging to divers, although in waters no more than five or six feet in depth.

We did not get any hippos that afternoon by means of our boat, but we killed two that were feeding on shore by cutting them off from their line of retreat to the river. They were of a very fair size, and it did not take long for our people to skin them, cut them up, and transport the meat to camp.

While we were on our way home Harry and I made a detour to the westward, partly to use up the time and partly in the hope of finding something worthy of our attention.

In a little nook at the edge of the forest we caught sight of three or four elands. It was rather unusual to see them as near as this to the forest, and we flattered ourselves that we would be able to bring down at least two of them; so we told our trackers and gun-bearers to drop back behind us, while we crept forward to stalk the elands, which we could do with ease, on account of their nearness to the wooded country. The only drawback to the business was that there was a patch of wait-a-bit thorns exactly between them and the forest. However, we were not going to let this impediment daunt us, and felt sure we would find some way of circumventing it.

We worked our way along pretty well among the creepers and other growths that covered the ground, and had got within about sixty yards of the nearest of the elands when we were startled by a very emphatic growl that seemed to come from almost under our feet. I do not know whether I turned pale or not; Harry says I did, and I know he did. It was enough to make any one turn pale; for there, within twenty yards of us, were two lions that were engaged in a rival occupation to ours. They were stalking those very elands, and they did not relish the idea of interference. One of the lions was standing up and looking in our direction; the other was crouching with his nose pointed toward the elands.