EXTINCTION AND DIMINUTION OF GAME IN SOUTH AFRICA--NOTES ON THE CAPE
BUFFALO
Extinction of the blaauwbok and the true quagga--Threatened
extermination of the black and white rhinoceros and the buffalo
in South Africa--Former abundance of game--Scene in the valley
of Dett witnessed by the author in 1873--Buffaloes protected
by the Cape Government--But few survivors in other parts of
South Africa--Abundance of buffaloes in former times--Extent of
their range--Still plentiful in places up to 1896--The terrible
epidemic of rinderpest--Character of the African buffalo--A
matter of individual experience--Comparison of buffalo with the
lion and elephant--Danger of following wounded buffaloes into
thick cover--Personal experiences--Well-known sportsman killed
by a buffalo--Usual action of buffaloes when wounded--Difficult
to stop when actually charging--The moaning bellow of a dying
buffalo--Probable reasons for some apparently unprovoked attacks
by buffaloes--Speed of buffaloes--Colour, texture, and abundance
of coat at different ages--Abundance of buffaloes along the Chobi
river--Demeanour of old buffalo bulls--"God's cattle"--Elephants
waiting for a herd of buffaloes to leave a pool of water before
themselves coming down to drink.
Since the first settlement of Europeans at the Cape of Good Hope
in the seventeenth century, two species of the indigenous fauna of
South Africa have become absolutely extinct. These are the blaauwbok
(_Hippotragus leucophaeus_) and the true quagga (_Equus quagga_). Both
these animals, however, were nearly related to species which still
exist in considerable numbers, for the blaauwbok must in appearance
have looked very much like a small roan antelope in which the black
face markings and conspicuous white tufts under the eyes were wanting;
whilst the true quagga was nothing but the dullest coloured and most
southerly form of Burchell's zebra. Deplorable, therefore, as is the
loss of these two animals, it is not quite so distressing as it would
be had they been the sole representatives of the genera to which they
belonged, and personally I look upon the disappearance of the Cape
buffalo and the black and white rhinoceros from almost every part of
Southern Africa, over which these animals once wandered so plentifully,
with far greater regret; for when these highly specialised and most
interesting creatures have completely disappeared from the face of the
South African veld, there will be no living species of animal left
alive in that country which resembles them in the remotest degree.
Of course, neither the Cape buffalo nor either of the two species of
rhinoceroses indigenous to Africa are yet absolutely extinct in the
country to the south of the Zambesi river; but of the great white
or square-mouthed, grass-eating rhinoceroses, the largest of all
terrestrial mammals after the elephant, none are left alive to-day with
the exception of some half-dozen which still survive in Zululand, and a
very few which are believed to exist in the neighbourhood of the Angwa
river, in Southern Rhodesia. A few of the black or prehensile-lipped
species are, I should think, still to be found here and there
throughout the great stretch of uninhabited country which lies between
the high plateaus of Southern Rhodesia and the Zambesi river, but, like
their congener the white rhinoceros, they are now entirely extinct
throughout all but an infinitesimal proportion of the vast territories
over which they ranged so plentifully only half a century ago.
By the enforcement of game laws, and the establishment of large
sanctuaries in uninhabited parts of the country, it will be possible,
I think, to preserve in considerable numbers all the many species
of antelopes still inhabiting South Africa, as well as the handsome
striped zebras, for a long time to come; but never again can such
scenes be witnessed as were constantly presented to the eyes of the
earlier travellers in the interior of that country.
Then not only were many species of richly coloured graceful antelopes
and zebras everywhere to be seen, but in the early mornings and
evenings great herds of rugged horned buffaloes on their way to or
from their drinking-places almost rivalled the lesser game in numbers,
whilst, scattered amongst all these denizens of the modern world, the
numerous long-horned, heavy-headed white rhinoceroses, together with
their more alert and active-looking cousins of the prehensile-lipped
species, must have appeared like survivals from a far-distant epoch of
the world's history.
Even in my own time all the great game of Southern Africa was in places
still abundant, and a scene which I once witnessed in October 1873 will
never fade from my memory. I was at that time hunting elephants in the
country to the south-east of the Victoria Falls, and one afternoon,
when approaching a swampy valley known to the Bushmen by the name of
"Dett," I came unexpectedly on a herd of these animals. I had killed
one young bull and severely wounded a second, when I was charged by
a big cow with long white tusks. I stood my ground and fired into
her chest as she came on, on which she at once stopped screaming and
swerved off, giving me the opportunity to place another shot in her
ribs with my second gun. At that time I was only armed with two old
muzzle-loading four-bore elephant guns, of the clumsiest and most
antiquated description, but they hit hard nevertheless. Having got
rid of the vicious old cow, I again followed the wounded bull, which I
presently laid low. When my Kafirs had all assembled round the carcase,
one of them said that he had seen the cow after I had fired at her,
and that he thought she would not go far, as she was only walking very
slowly and throwing great quantities of blood from her trunk. I at once
resolved to follow her, and soon found that she was heading straight
for the valley of Dett, for which I was very thankful, since the day
had been intensely hot, and my Kafirs and I were badly in want of
water, as we had drunk all we had been able to carry in our calabashes
before we came on the elephants.
The sun was low in the western sky, and, seen through the haze of many
grass fires, had already turned from blazing yellow to a dull red,
when the spoor of the wounded elephant led us suddenly out of the
forest into the open grassy valley, some three or four hundred yards
broad, through which the little stream of the Dett made its sluggish
way, forming many fine pools of water along its course. Immediately we
emerged from the forest we saw the carcase of the elephant we had been
following lying in the open ground within fifty yards of the water for
which the poor animal had been making, but had not quite been able to
reach. It was too late to commence chopping out the tusks, but, leaving
some of my Kafirs to cut bushes and grass and prepare a camping-place
for the night on the edge of the forest, I went with the rest to cut
open the dead elephant and get the heart out for my supper.
It was whilst I was so engaged that I saw appear along the valley of
Dett the most interesting collection of wild animals that I think I
have ever seen collected together in a small extent of ground.
First, a few hundred yards higher up the valley than where we were
working, a herd of nine giraffes stalked slowly and majestically from
the forest, and, making their way to a pool of water, commenced to
drink. These giraffes remained in the open valley until dark, one or
other of them from time to time straddling out its forelegs in a most
extraordinary manner in order to get its mouth down to the water. No
other animals came to drink in the pools between us and the giraffes.
Possibly some got our wind before leaving the shelter of the forest,
though the evening was very still. But below us, as far as one could
see down the valley, the open ground was presently alive with game.
One after another, great herds of buffaloes emerged from the forest
on either side of the valley and fed slowly down to the water. One
of these herds was preceded by about fifty zebras, and another by a
large herd of sable antelopes. Presently two other herds of sable
antelopes appeared upon the scene, a second herd of zebras, and five
magnificently horned old koodoo bulls, whilst rhinoceroses both of the
black and white species (the latter predominating in numbers) were
scattered amongst the other game, singly or in twos and threes all down
the valley. Of course all this great concourse of wild animals had been
collected together in the neighbourhood of the valley of Dett owing to
the drying up of all the vleys in the surrounding country, and during
the rainy season would have been scattered over a wide area.
It is sad to think that of all those buffaloes and rhinoceroses I saw
in the valley of Dett on that October evening, less than five and
thirty years ago, not one single one nor any of their descendants are
left alive to-day. They were all killed off years ago, almost all by
the natives of Matabeleland after these people became possessed of
firearms, purchased for the most part on the Diamond Fields.
As was to be expected, the rhinoceroses were the first to go, but the
buffaloes, in spite of their prodigious numbers in many parts of South
Africa only a generation ago, did not long survive them, for wherever
the epidemic of rinderpest penetrated in 1896 it almost completely
destroyed all the buffaloes which up till then had escaped the native
hunters.
It is very difficult to say with any exactitude how many buffaloes
still exist in South Africa to-day. There are a certain number of these
animals in the Addo bush and the Knysna forest, in the Cape Colony,
which are protected by the Cape Government, and there is also a small
but increasing herd inhabiting the game-reserve which has recently been
established in the Eastern Transvaal. Besides these, there may be a few
in the Zululand reserve which survived the rinderpest, whilst a poor
remnant of the great herds I saw in the Pungwe river district in 1891
and 1892 undoubtedly still survive in that part of the country. Farther
north, it is quite possible that there may still be a considerable
number of buffaloes to the north and north-east of the high plateau
of Mashunaland in the neighbourhood of Mount Darwin, and also in the
valleys of the Umsengaisi, Panyami, and Sanyati rivers. It all depends
upon whether the rinderpest penetrated to these regions in 1896 and
1897.[8]
[8] I have lately learned that the route followed by cattle which are
now frequently brought from N.E. Rhodesia to Salisbury, in Mashunaland,
is down the valley of the Loangwa river to the Zambesi, and after that
river has been crossed up the course of the Panyami to Salisbury. In
1882, and again in 1887, I found buffaloes very numerous all along the
Panyami river from the Zambesi to a point only a few miles north of Lo
Magondi's, and wherever the buffaloes were found, tse-tse flies were
also very numerous. There can be no tse-tse flies along the Panyami
to-day, if I have been correctly informed that cattle are brought to
Mashunaland by this route, and there can be no buffaloes there either,
or the tse-tse flies would not have disappeared. No doubt the buffaloes
were destroyed by the epidemic of rinderpest in 1896-97, and their
disappearance was quickly followed, as has been the case in so many
other districts of South Africa, by the dying out of the tse-tse flies.
I fear that very few buffaloes can now be left in any part of Northern
Mashunaland, since the rinderpest appears to have swept through all
that country.
To the west of the river Gwai, however, I believe that few, if any,
buffaloes still survive in the interior of South Africa, though in
my own personal experience I met with these animals in extraordinary
numbers wherever I hunted between 1872 and 1880 in that part of the
country, whether to the south-east of the Victoria Falls, or farther
westwards along the Zambesi and as far as I went along the Chobi, or in
the valleys of the Machabi (an overflow from the Okavango), the Mababi,
or the Tamalakan.
In fact, speaking generally, the Cape buffalo was formerly very
abundant everywhere throughout South Africa wherever there was a
plentiful supply of water and grass in close proximity to shady
forests; for these animals never appear to have frequented open country
anywhere to the south of the Zambesi. They spread themselves all
down the thickly wooded coast belt of East and South Africa as far
as Mossel Bay, and along all the tributaries of the Zambesi and the
Limpopo rivers, and it was probably from the headwaters of the Marico
and Notwani rivers that they found their way to the Molopo, and thence
through Bechwanaland to the Orange river.
Buffaloes were met with in that district, about 1783, by the French
traveller Le Vaillant, and in Southern Bechwanaland some five and
twenty years later by the missionary John Campbell, whilst in 1845 Mr.
W. Cotton Oswell still found large herds of these animals living in
the reed beds of the Molopo; but it is worthy of remark that, owing to
the gradual desiccation of the country, which has been and still is
constantly taking place in South-Western Africa, there is to-day not
enough water to support a herd of buffaloes either in the Molopo river
or anywhere to the south of it, throughout Bechwanaland.
During the quarter of a century succeeding the year 1871 (during which
I first visited South Africa) the range of the buffalo had been very
much curtailed, but up to 1896 these animals were still numerous in
many of the uninhabited parts of the country, and especially so in
the Pungwe river district of South-East Africa. In the early part of
that most fatal year, however, the terrible epidemic of rinderpest
crossed the Zambesi, and besides depleting nearly the whole of South
Africa of cattle before a stop was put to its ravages by Dr. Koch,
almost absolutely exterminated the buffaloes. The few that remain will
probably be gradually killed off, I am afraid, and I think it quite
likely that before many more years have passed the only buffaloes left
in South Africa will be those living in the Addo bush in the Cape
Colony.
There was always a considerable difference of opinion amongst South
African hunters in the old pre-rinderpest times as to the character of
the Cape buffalo, but there is no doubt that this animal was looked
upon by all experienced men as a dangerous antagonist under certain
conditions, whilst by some it was considered to be the most dangerous
of all African game. It is all a matter of individual experience. A man
who has shot two or three lions and a few buffaloes, and who, whilst
having had no trouble with the former animals, has been charged and
perhaps only narrowly escaped with his life from one or more of the
latter, will naturally consider the buffalo to be a more dangerous
animal than a lion, and _vice versa_.
Personally I consider that, speaking generally, the South African lion
is a much more dangerous animal than the South African buffalo, for not
only can a lion hide much more easily and rush on to its antagonist
much more quickly than a buffalo, but the former is, I think, much
more savage by nature, on the average, than the latter. As regards
viciousness I should be inclined to put the buffalo third on the list
of dangerous African game, without reckoning the leopard (of which
animal I have not had sufficient experience to offer an opinion) and
the black rhinoceros (whose true character it seems so difficult to
understand); for, whilst putting the lion first, I think the elephant
should come second, as I believe that of a hundred elephants shot, a
greater proportion will charge than of the same number of buffaloes.
However, a charging elephant can almost always be stopped with a
bullet, and it is most difficult to stop a charging buffalo; therefore
the latter is perhaps actually the more dangerous animal of the two.
To follow a wounded buffalo into a bed of reeds, or into long grass,
where it is almost impossible to see it before getting to very close
quarters, is a most dangerous, not to say foolhardy, proceeding. It is
quite exciting enough to follow one of these animals when wounded into
thick bush, but there you have a chance of seeing it as soon as, if not
before, it sees you.
I have had a very considerable experience with South African buffaloes,
having killed 175 of these animals to my own rifle, and helped to
kill at least fifty others. When hunting on the Chobi river in 1877,
and again in 1879, I had to shoot a great many buffaloes to supply my
native followers with meat, as I did not come across many elephants in
either of those years.
During 1877 I killed to my own rifle forty-seven buffaloes, and in 1879
fifty. All these buffaloes, with the exception of five, which I shot
when hunting on horseback near the Mababi river in the latter year,
were killed on foot, and a large number of them were followed, after
having been wounded, into thick bush, and there finally despatched.
If the Cape buffalo was really such a ferocious and diabolically
cunning beast as it has often been represented to have been, it seems
to me that I have been very badly treated in the way of adventures
with these animals. I have, of course, had a few more or less exciting
experiences with buffaloes, but they only happened occasionally, and
I never thought it necessary to make my will before attacking a herd
of these animals. In 1874, when very young and inexperienced, and
very badly armed with a clumsy muzzle-loading elephant gun, my horse
was tossed and killed by an old bull which I had been chasing, and I
afterwards received a blow from one of its horns on the shoulder as I
lay on the ground. I was once knocked down, too, by another buffalo,
which charged from behind a bush at very close quarters, but I escaped
without serious injury. On another occasion an old bull which had been
recently mauled by lions, and at which one of my Kafirs had thrown an
assegai, put me into a tree, as I had not a gun in my hands, when it
charged. I once dodged a charging buffalo by leaping aside when its
outstretched nose was quite close to me, and then, swinging myself
round a small tree, ran past its hind-quarters; but I was young then,
in perfect training and full of confidence in myself. Following on
the blood spoor of wounded buffaloes, very cautiously in soft shoes,
and holding my rifle at the ready and on full cock, I believe I have
often in thick bush just got a shot in, in time to prevent a good
many of these animals from charging. I became used to this work, and
my eyes, through constant practice, could see a buffalo standing in
thick cover as soon as it was possible to do so, and as soon as it
could see me. My only clothing, too, in those days used to be a cotton
shirt, a soft felt hat, and a pair of shoes. Had I been short-sighted
or dull-sighted, and gone blundering into thick jungle after wounded
buffaloes, in heavy shooting boots and thick clothes, as inexperienced
sportsmen sometimes used to do, I might have met with more adventures
than I have done.
Of course, in the pursuit of any kind of big game which becomes
dangerous when wounded, accidents will sometimes occur to the most
experienced hunters. The Hon. Guy Dawnay, it will be remembered, was
killed many years ago in East Africa by a buffalo which he had wounded.
This gentleman, whom I met in Matabeleland in 1873, had had a great
deal of experience in hunting all kinds of African game before meeting
with the accident which cost him his life, and was an exceptionally
athletic young Englishman.
In all my experience I can only remember one wounded buffalo, when
being followed through open forest, charging from a distance of perhaps
a hundred yards, but lions when chased on horseback will often, even
before they have been fired at, turn and charge from even a greater
distance.
When wounded in open country a buffalo will always make for thick
cover. Before it reaches this, it will perhaps see you several times
following on its tracks. It will then stop, turn, and, with head raised
and outstretched nose, stand looking at you for a few seconds, but if
able to do so will almost invariably gallop off again. When it has
reached the retreat for which it is making, it will presently halt, but
unless very badly wounded will not lie down for some time. Personally,
I have never known a wounded buffalo to circle round and then stand
watching near its own tracks for its approaching enemies; but I can
imagine that one of these animals when wounded might go zigzagging
about in a thick piece of jungle, and, without any fixed intention of
waylaying its pursuers, might be just about to cross its own tracks at
the very point these latter had reached when following on its spoor.
Then it would almost certainly charge, with a good chance of scoring a
success.
My own experience has been that in thick cover wounded buffaloes
usually stood behind a bush at right angles to their tracks. In such a
position, standing quite motionless, they were very difficult to see,
whilst they had every chance of hearing or seeing anything approaching
on their spoor before being themselves observed. In such cases they
would nearly always be broadside on to the hunter, and if one's eyes
were trained to pick up game quickly in all kinds of surroundings,
there would be time to get a shot in before the wounded animals swung
round and started on their charge. Struck in this way with a heavy
bullet somewhere near the junction of the neck and the shoulder before
the charge had actually commenced, a wounded buffalo would run off
again. Once, however, a buffalo is actually charging, no bullet will
turn or stop it, unless its brain is pierced or its neck or one of
its legs broken. A charging buffalo comes on grunting loudly, with
outstretched nose and horns laid back on its neck, and does not lower
its head to strike until close up to its enemy. The outstretched nose
of the buffalo which killed my horse was within a few inches of my
leg before it dipped its head, and, with a sweeping blow, inflicted a
fearful wound in the poor animal's flank.
I once hit a charging buffalo at a distance of perhaps thirty yards,
right in the chest, with a round bullet fired from an old four-bore
elephant gun. This bullet just grazed this old bull's heart, cutting
a groove through one side of it, and then, after traversing the whole
length of its body, lodged under the skin of one of its hind-legs; yet
this brave and determined animal still came on, and struck a blow at
a Kafir who was trying to climb a tree close beside me. It then, after
running only a short distance farther, lay down and died. Almost always
when a buffalo is dying it gives vent to a moaning bellow, which can be
heard at a considerable distance. It is a sound which, once heard, can
never be forgotten.
On June 24, 1877, I had a somewhat curious experience with a buffalo
on the banks of the Chobi river. Some natives came to my camp on the
morning of that day and informed me that there were three old buffalo
bulls in the thick bush along the river's edge only a few hundred
yards away, and at the same time begged me to try and shoot them,
as they and their people were very badly off for food. Yielding to
their entreaties, I at once went after the buffaloes, and, putting my
Bushmen spoorers on their fresh tracks, soon came up with them in some
thickish bush, and killed two of them with consecutive shots from a
single-barrelled ten-bore rifle. The third ran off towards the river,
and I dashed after him in hot pursuit. Just along the edge of the bush,
and fringing the open ground which skirted the reedy swamp, through
which the river ran at this point, there grew a fringe of palmetto
scrub, the large leaves of which hung over to the ground. Into this the
buffalo dashed, and I followed close behind him. I thought he had gone
through the palmetto scrub, into which one could not see a yard, into
the open ground beyond, and so never slackened my pace, but went at it
at full speed; but the old bull had halted suddenly, and was standing
still behind the screen formed by the overhanging leaves of one of the
palmetto bushes. He could only just have turned himself broadside to
listen when I ran full tilt into him, and was thrown on the ground flat
on my back by the violence of the impact. Probably the buffalo was as
much surprised as I was. At any rate, he never stopped to see what had
happened, but galloped off again across the open ground on the other
side of the palmetto scrub and plunged into the reeds.
Men who hunted big game in South Africa at a time when that country
was worth living in, are often charged with wastefully slaughtering
large numbers of wild animals. Every one must answer this charge for
himself. Personally I do not plead guilty. I never killed any animal
for mere sport; but it was often necessary to shoot what may seem to
any one who does not realise the circumstances an extravagant amount
of game in order not only to supply one's own followers with food, but
also to gain the goodwill of the natives of the country in which one
was travelling. I find an entry in my diary for August 20, 1879: "Shot
six buffalo bulls." That without explanation seems a big order. But, as
it happened, on the previous evening I had met my friends Collison and
Miller on the banks of the Chobi, and found them both down with fever,
and their native followers without food. The next day it was necessary
for me to shoot enough meat not only to supply the immediate wants of
more than fifty men, but to take them to the waggons on the Mababi
river, which was several days' journey distant.
Taking up the spoor of a big herd of buffaloes, I killed six fine
bulls, not one ounce of meat of any one of which was wasted.
Incidentally I may say that I killed these six buffalo bulls with ten
shots from a single-barrelled ten-bore rifle, using round bullets and
six drachms of powder. I had no kind of adventure with any one of these
animals. Another entry for December 6 in the same year stands: "Nine
Burchell's zebras; two eland bulls." These animals were killed soon
after leaving the Mababi for Bamangwato, and without the supply of
meat thus obtained it would have gone very hard with the large number
of Khama's people who were travelling with me, and who were almost
entirely dependent upon me for food. Khama thanked me very heartily on
my return to Bamangwato for the assistance I had given to his people.
To return to buffaloes, old bulls are often said to be very bad
tempered and liable to charge without the slightest provocation. Many
instances can, no doubt, be cited of men having suddenly been charged
and either killed or badly maimed by one of these animals. If all these
cases, however, had been thoroughly investigated, I believe it would
have been found that such unprovoked attacks had for the most part been
made by wounded animals lying in thick cover or long grass, which were
suffering from injuries inflicted either by lions or by human hunters.
Such animals would naturally be morose and dangerous to approach.
I have not shot many buffaloes when hunting on horseback, as in my time
these animals were seldom found except in countries infested by the
tse-tse fly, which fatally affects horses and cattle. However, I have
galloped after at least a dozen herds of buffaloes, riding alongside of
them and continually dismounting and firing at one or other of their
number. Only on one occasion did an unwounded buffalo leave the herd
and charge me. This was a cow which gave me a smart chase for perhaps
a hundred yards. It is astonishing at what a speed a buffalo can run
when charging. It certainly takes a good horse to get away from one,
although when following a herd of buffaloes on horseback one can easily
keep alongside of them at a hand-gallop. Even on foot I never found any
difficulty in keeping up with a herd of buffaloes and shooting as many
as I required to supply my native followers with food. But, of course,
the life I led at that time, and the continual hard walking and running
necessary to earn my living, kept me in perfect training.
In the interior of South Africa, where the nights are very cold in the
winter-time, buffaloes used to get fairly abundant but never thick
coats when in their prime. The calves, which were born during January,
February, and March, were, when very young, covered with soft hair of
a reddish brown colour, but as they grew, the reddish tinge gradually
disappeared and they became dun coloured. They did not turn black until
they were fully three years of age. The hair of the Cape buffalo when
full-grown was always quite black and very coarse. The large ears were
bordered with long fringes of soft black hair, and the end of the tail
carried a good-sized tassel. When old, both bull and cow buffaloes lost
most of their hair, first on the middle of the back; but the baldness
gradually increased until very old animals of this species became
almost as hairless as a rhinoceros.
In the early 'seventies buffaloes were everywhere very plentiful along
the Zambesi and its tributaries, but nowhere so abundant as along the
Chobi river. So numerous were they along both banks of this river, that
one would have thought that they had reached the very limits of their
food-supply. They were usually found consorting together in herds of
from fifty or sixty to two or three hundred individuals. Once I saw
what I think must have been several large herds collected together, as
the total number of the troop could not have been less than a thousand.
A grass fire had probably destroyed the pasture on the ground where
several herds had lately been living, and they were all moving up the
river together in search of food. In districts where buffaloes were
plentiful, old bulls, which had either been driven from the herds by
younger animals or had voluntarily retired from a society which bored
them, would often be encountered either alone or two or three together.
But along the Chobi I have often seen from five to ten old buffalo
bulls consorting together, and I once saw as many as fifteen very old
males in one troop.
[Illustration: "SUCH OLD BUFFALO BULLS WERE VERY SLOW ABOUT GETTING OUT
OF ONE'S WAY."]
Where the country had not been much disturbed, such old buffalo bulls
were very slow about getting out of one's way, and would stand calmly
watching the approach of so unaccustomed a visitor to their haunts as
a human being without showing any sign of fear. Their demeanour was
indeed apparently aggressive and truculent; still, although I have
walked up to or close past a very large number in the aggregate of old
buffalo bulls, I have never known one to charge before being interfered
with. With outstretched noses these formidable-looking creatures would
stand gazing at one with sullen eyes from under their massive rugged
horns, and would not sometimes run off before sticks and stones were
thrown at them; but in my experience they always did run off sooner or
later. African buffaloes are, after all, nothing but wild cattle. My
Matabele boys used frequently to speak of them as "Izinkomo ka M'limo"
("God's cattle"). I have walked past thousands and thousands of them,
and have never known one to charge when unprovoked. But when a buffalo
which has been mauled by lions or wounded by some hunter, and is lying
sick and sore in long grass or thick bush, suddenly sees a number of
human beings advancing towards its retreat, it will very likely jump up
and charge through them, inflicting perhaps a deadly blow with one of
its massive crooked horns as it passes. Once a buffalo has been wounded
and gets into thick jungle or reeds or long grass, it becomes a most
dangerous animal, especially to an inexperienced sportsman who has not
yet acquired the art of seeing an animal standing motionless in the
shade of dense bush as soon as it is physically possible to do so, and
who cannot walk noiselessly on the tracks of wounded game.
It has often been stated that on the approach of a herd of elephants
to drink at a pool of water, all other animals will at once retire and
make way for them. Very likely this may be true as a general rule, but
I remember one occasion upon which a herd of some thirty elephants
coming down to drink at a vley early in the night, and finding a large
herd of buffaloes at the water before them, waited until these latter
animals had quenched their thirst and fed slowly off into the forest
before themselves going down to the pool.
This happened on a night in November 1873, when the moon, nearly at the
full, was shining in a cloudless sky.
I was camped near a fine vley of fresh rain-water in the country to
the west of the river Gwai, in Matabeleland, and had just finished my
evening meal, when a large herd of buffaloes came to drink, and had
hardly reached the water when we saw a troop of elephants approaching.
These latter passed very near to my encampment, and must have seen our
fires, as one after another they faced towards us, and stood looking
in our direction with outspread ears. They did not, however, get our
wind, and though they must have been suspicious, they were, I suppose,
very thirsty. But as long as the buffaloes remained on the open ground
round the pool of water, the elephants did not advance, remaining about
a hundred yards away, just within the edge of a thin forest of mopani
trees. Directly, however, the buffaloes had fed away into the forest on
the other side of the vley, the greater beasts advanced very quickly
to the water's edge, and, arranging themselves in a row, stood for a
long time sucking up the grateful fluid through their trunks. As they
were all cows and young animals, and there were some fine bulls in the
district, I did not disturb them. Of course, I cannot say whether or no
the buffaloes were aware of the proximity of the elephants, but I am
quite certain that the latter not only saw and smelt the wild cattle,
but waited until they had retired before themselves advancing to the
water.