I Called Out That He
Was Dead, And At Once Everyone In The Boma
Turned Out, Bringing All The Lanterns In The Place.
With The Others Came My Indian Overseer, Who
Shouted That He Too Wanted Revenge, As Some Of
The Goats Had Belonged To Him.
Whereupon
he levelled his revolver at the dead leopard,
and shutting his eyes tightly, fired four shots in
rapid succession.
Naturally not one of these
touched the beast, but they caused considerable
consternation amongst the onlookers, who
scattered rapidly to right and left. Next morning
a party of starving Wa Kamba happened to
be passing just as I was about to skin the leopard,
and asked by means of signs to be allowed to
do the job for me and then to take the meat. I
of course assented to this proposal, and in a very
few minutes the skin had been neatly taken off,
and the famishing natives began a ravenous meal
on the raw flesh.
Wild dogs are also very destructive, and often
caused great losses among our sheep and goats.
Many a night have I listened to these animals
hunting and harrying some poor creature of the
wilds round my camp; they never relinquish
a chase, and will attack anything, man or beast,
when really driven by hunger. I was at Tsavo
Station one day - unfortunately without my rifle -
when one of these dogs came up and stood
within about thirty yards of me. He was a
fine-looking beast, bigger than a collie, with
jet-black hair and a white-tipped bushy tail.
I was very sorry that I had not brought my
rifle, as I badly wanted a specimen and never
had another chance of obtaining one.
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