A naturalist in Mid-Africa: being an account of a journey to the Mountains of the Moon and Tanganyika . able togrow, and these usually have a very thick, gummybark, which seems to act as an insulator. Thesetrees are of very different orders—a kind of Protea,an Eugenia, &c. These African fires are not in the least like theAmerican pictures, where one sees mustangs withtheir eyes protruding, and a happy family ofjaguars, snakes, pronghorns, &c, all fleeing fortheir lives. It is a very insignificant line ofblazing grass, which one can easily step is sometimes stopped by a hard-trodden n
A naturalist in Mid-Africa: being an account of a journey to the Mountains of the Moon and Tanganyika . able togrow, and these usually have a very thick, gummybark, which seems to act as an insulator. Thesetrees are of very different orders—a kind of Protea,an Eugenia, &c. These African fires are not in the least like theAmerican pictures, where one sees mustangs withtheir eyes protruding, and a happy family ofjaguars, snakes, pronghorns, &c, all fleeing fortheir lives. It is a very insignificant line ofblazing grass, which one can easily step is sometimes stopped by a hard-trodden nativepath and almost always by a river, where the thickfoliage of the trees keeps sufficient permanentmoisture to save all except the outlying branchesfrom being even singed. It has a curious effect on some of the smaller shrubs, which patiently put 4 84 A NATURALIST IN MID-AFRICA. on every year a stem and branches which isannually burnt down. Sometimes a stem, ap-parently ten years old, may be seen supportinga trunk of only a few months growth. From the top of the Nandi range I sent back. Fig. 8.—Camp at Mkuyuni. the head of my first buck, a Jacksons Harte-beest (Bubalis JacJcsoni) ; this was a young andconfiding animal, which allowed me to creep upto within 100 yards behind an ant-hill and kill itwith a Winchester rifle. My ball hit just twoinches below the spine, a little in front of thepelvis, and its hind-quarters were paralysed. I KIKUYU TO THE VICTORIA. 35 have found this since to be a very deadly shot, asthe animal cannot move from the spot. My previous experiences as a hunter had beenmaddening. They usually consisted of crawlingin breathless and perspiring silence on mystomach for about 500 yards (always losing mypipe in the process), to be rewarded, on cautiouslyraising my head above the grass, by the view ofa hartebeest shambling awkwardly away witha derisive and malevolent look in his eye—thecharacteristic expression of this, the most ugly ofall the antelopes.
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