After hunting in this region for some days, during which we saw many lion and killed six, we pushed on up-stream again. We were soon held up by more elephant and more natives. The news of our doings had already reached the villages south of us, and we had a continuous stream of natives coming hungry to us, carrying our bush loads all over the country, to be rewarded eventually with meat, and then stopping to smoke it while their places were taken by newcomers. So prolific in game was the country that we never reached Lake Mamun, as we had intended. Our time was up, food exhausted and canoes laden. So one fine day we decided to return.
XIII
BUFFALO
There is no animal in Africa with such a sinister reputation as the buffalo, whether the bush cow of West Africa or the great black Cape buffalo be under discussion. It has been repeatedly accused of dreadful cunning and great ferocity, and it has undoubtedly caused many deaths and maulings among both white and native hunters. Among the cases which have come under my own observation or of which I have heard from reliable sources, the maulings have been far more numerous than the deaths. The wounds caused by buffalo horns seem to heal better than lion bites; the latter, when made by old lions with dirty teeth, can be very troublesome.
Why the buffalo should have got such an evil name has always rather puzzled me. I have shot hundreds of both kinds during my hunting career, and I have never been charged. And yet I have constantly read of fierce encounters between hunters and their game. Two white men were killed recently in Nigeria by a bush cow, and I have frequently asked for certain natives by name on revisiting villages and have been told that they have been killed by buffalo. Yet, even when I came suddenly on a buffalo bull lying wounded in thick stuff, he did not charge. This animal had been mauled by lion, and according to all the rules should have charged as soon as he became aware of my approach. What he would have done had I not put a bullet through his neck I do not know. Perhaps he might have charged.
IN THICK STUFF.
WORTHY GAME.
