The Empty Shells Were
Hardly Away From The Chambers, However, When A Long Brown Arm
Shot Over My Right Shoulder And Popped Two Fresh Cartridges In
The Breech.
So astonished was I at this unexpected apparition,
that for a second or so I actually forgot to close the gun.
VII. ON THE MARCH
After leaving the First Game Camp, we travelled many hours and
miles over rolling hills piling ever higher and higher until they
broke through a pass to illimitable plains. These plains were
mantled with the dense scrub, looking from a distance and from
above like the nap of soft green velvet. Here and there this
scrub broke in round or oval patches of grass plain. Great
mountain ranges peered over the edge of a horizon. Lesser
mountain peaks of fantastic shapes-sheer Yosemite cliffs, single
buttes, castles-had ventured singly from behind that same
horizon barricade. The course of a river was marked by a
meandering line of green jungle.
It took us two days to get to that river. Our intermediate camp
was halfway down the pass. We ousted a hundred indignant
straw-coloured monkeys and twice as many baboons from the tiny
flat above the water hole. They bobbed away cursing over their
shoulders at us. Next day we debouched on the plains. They were
rolling, densely grown, covered with volcanic stones, swarming
with game of various sorts. The men marched well. They were
happy, for they had had a week of meat; and each carried a light
lunch of sun-dried biltong or jerky.
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