A JOURNEY TO AMATONGALAND (_concluded_)
Receive information concerning the haunts of the inyala--Heavy
thunderstorm--Start for Gugawi's kraal--Cross the Usutu
river--Reach Gugawi's--Go out hunting--Crested guinea-fowl
seen--Two inyalas shot--Angas's description of the inyala
antelope--Inyala skins prepared for mounting--Now safe in
Natural History Museum--A third inyala shot--One missed--Move
farther up the Usutu river--Country denuded of game--Bushbucks
scarce--Hippopotamuses in river--Heavy thunderstorm--Two more male
inyalas shot--Start on return journey to Delagoa Bay--Tedious
journey--Intense heat--End of trip--Slight attacks of fever.
There were now abundant signs that I was approaching the haunts of the
beautiful antelope I had come so far to seek, as inyala skins and horns
were very much in evidence round Mr. Wissels's store, and several of
the latter had manifestly been but recently killed. All these animals,
Longman assured me, had been shot by the Amatonga within a short
distance of the store, in the dense jungles lying in the angle between
the Usutu and Pongolo rivers, which I could now see covering some low
ridges at a distance of not more than six or seven miles from where we
stood. Had it not been for the rain, I should have gone on the same
afternoon; however, I gathered a good deal of information and arranged
for a start with fresh carriers as early as possible the following
day--my objective point being the kraal of an Amatonga headman named
Gugawi, who, I was told, lived a few miles up the Usutu river, on the
very edge of the jungle where inyalas were said to be plentiful. I
noticed, however, that my informants were not over confident about my
being likely to shoot any of these animals. When I asked if I should
be sure to see some, they replied, "The imbala-intendi (the local
name in this part of Amatongaland for the inyala) is very cunning; he
lives in the very densest jungle, and never comes into the open except
at nights; he is very cunning; he is a witch is the imbala-intendi."
They all agreed, however, in declaring that there were plenty of them,
although they were difficult to get a sight of. Well, there was nothing
for it but to do my best, and deserve success even if I could not
attain it.
That night we had a most tremendous thunderstorm, the rain falling in
torrents; and as the place in which I was sleeping was not water-tight,
I had rather a bad time of it, and was very glad when day broke.
The thunderstorm had cleared the air, and Sunday, September 27, dawned
bright and clear, with every prospect of its being a fine day. I had
all my things packed up pretty early, and with four new women carriers,
and accompanied by two men who knew the way to Gugawi's kraal, managed
to get off about an hour after sunrise, and reached my destination
before ten o'clock. On our way we crossed the Usutu river--here a
clear, swift-flowing stream, about two hundred yards in breadth,
running over a bed of sand. We waded across it, and found the water
quite shallow for the most part, and never more than three feet deep.
On reaching the kraal we were making for, I told Longman to cook me
some breakfast; and whilst he was frying me some reedbuck steaks,
I had a talk with the headman Gugawi and told him the reason of my
visit. He replied that the "imbala-intendi" were numerous in the
jungle just behind his kraal, and promised to do his best to help me
to secure the specimens I wanted, though, like every one else, he said
the animals were very cunning and difficult to get a sight of. As
soon as I had had my breakfast, I asked Gugawi to give me a man who
was well acquainted with the habits of the inyala, as I wished to go
into the bush after them without any loss of time. He gave me one of
his sons, and, accompanied by Longman and one of the Kafirs who had
come from Mr. Wissels's store, we forthwith entered the jungle, which
extended to within a few yards of the kraal. From this we were not
distant more than two hundred yards before we saw fresh inyala spoor
plainly imprinted in the wet ground. The rain at least had done us this
service, that it had washed out all old spoor and rendered any fresh
tracks quite conspicuous.
We now commenced to creep very cautiously through the thick thorny
bush, making our way for the most part through tunnels made by
hippopotamuses during their night excursions in search of food. We had
usually to walk bent nearly double, often having to creep on our hands
and knees; and, as the air was very hot and steamy, we were soon bathed
in perspiration. Now and again we came to little open spaces in the
bush, and in one of these, which we passed through soon after leaving
the kraal, I saw a very handsome crested guinea-fowl, the same species,
no doubt (_Guttera edouardi_), as that met with on the central Zambesi,
to the east of the Victoria Falls.
We had been creeping about the bush in the uncomfortable manner
I have described for about an hour, when we came suddenly upon a
little circular opening some fifty or sixty yards in diameter. As we
approached the edge of this open space, advancing very cautiously in a
stooping attitude down a hippopotamus path, my guide suddenly dropped
to the ground. As he did so, I got a clear view past him, and saw,
standing amongst the grass and bush, just on the further side of the
opening, what I knew was an inyala doe, as I could distinctly see it
was reddish in colour. I could see no other animal near her, and as I
required two specimens of inyala does, the one for the British and the
other for the South African Museum, I lost no time about firing at the
animal in question, which I saw drop instantly to the shot. But even
as she did so, there appeared in her place, or very close to where she
had stood, a great black shaggy form, which, indistinctly as I could
see it in the deep shadow of the bush, I knew was a male inyala--the
first that my eyes had ever looked upon in the flesh. My rifle was a
single-barrelled one; and before I could fire the shot that might make
that rare and beautiful beast mine, I had to open the breech of my
rifle, take another cartridge from my belt, slip it into the chamber,
close the breech again, and then raise the rifle to my shoulder and
take aim. All this meant time and noise. Would the inyala, which stood
like a statue by the dead body of his mate, give me the few seconds I
required to take his own life too? I little thought he would, but he
did; and as I raised my rifle once more, and took a quick but careful
sight on his dark shoulder, I felt, as I pulled the trigger, that he
was mine.
[Illustration: "I KNEW IT WAS A MALE INYALA--THE FIRST THAT MY EYES HAD
EVER LOOKED UPON."]
As the report of the rifle sounded, he plunged madly forward, and was
instantly lost to sight in the thick scrub. But I felt sure he carried
death with him; and so it proved, for we found him lying dead not
twenty yards from where he had stood when the bullet struck him. The
fatal missile had passed right through his shoulders, and having
expanded on impact, had torn his heart to pieces. I had the dead female
brought to where the male had fallen, and laid them side by side; then
stood admiring them for a long time before I could bring myself to skin
them. To thus secure a very handsome pair of inyala antelopes--whose
excellently mounted skins are now safe in the Mammalian Gallery of the
Natural History Museum at South Kensington--on the very first day I had
ever hunted for them, and after little more than an hour's search--was
indeed a most glorious and exceptional piece of good fortune, which,
however, has been balanced by many and many a day that I can remember
of unrequited labour in search of game.
I think I had here better give Mr. Angas's very careful descriptions
of the inyala antelope, male and female, as they are so detailed and
precise that they cannot be improved upon--except that, for a reason
which I shall refer to presently, I imagine that the male whose skin he
described could not have been fully adult.
Mr. Angas tells us that his notes "were drawn up from recently killed
specimens which he in vain attempted to purchase from the Boers who
possessed them," and are as follows: "The adult male is about 7 feet
6 inches in total length, and 3 feet 4 inches high at the shoulder.
Though elegant in form, and with much of the grace of the solitary
koodoo, the robust and shaggy aspect of the male bears considerable
resemblance to that of the goat. Legs clean, hoofs pointed and
black, with two oval cream-coloured spots in front of each fetlock,
immediately above the hoof. Horns of the specimen in question, 1 foot
10 inches long,[18] twisted and sublyrate, very similar to those of
the bushbuck, but rather more spiral; very sharp polished extremities
of a pale straw colour, rest of horns brownish black, deeply ridged
from the forehead to about half the length of the horn. Prevailing
colour, greyish black, tinged with purplish brown and ochre; on the
neck, flanks, and cheeks marked with several white stripes like the
koodoo. Forehead brilliant sienna brown, almost approaching to orange;
mane black down the neck, and white from the withers to the insertion
of the tail; ears, 8 inches long, oval, rufous, tipped with black,
and fringed inside with white hairs. A pale ochreous circle round the
eyes, which are connected by two white spots, forming an arrow-shaped
mark on a black ground; nose black; a white spot on each side of the
upper lip; chin and gullet white; and three white marks under each eye;
neck covered with long shaggy hair, extending also under the belly and
fringing the haunches to the knees; two white spots on the flanks,
and a patch of long white hair on the interior portion of the thigh;
a white tuft under the belly, and another on the dewlap. On the outer
side of the forelegs is a black patch above the knee surrounded by
three white spots; legs below the knee bright rufous colour; tail, 1
foot 8 inches long, black above, with tip and inside white." This most
detailed description is, I think, that of an animal not fully adult,
as in the three full-grown male inyalas which I saw in the flesh all
the buff, ochreous, and orange tints described by Mr. Angas had turned
to greyish black, except to a slight extent below the knees, whilst
none of them had any white stripes on the cheeks or neck; and, as the
general ground colour of the young male is reddish brown, and that
of a full-grown male greyish black, it goes without saying that, as
the young animal grows from kidhood to maturity, the former colour
gradually gives place to the latter--till, in a very old male, there
is no buff or ochre left except on the legs below the knees. Of the
female, Mr. Angas's description is as follows: "Smaller than the male,
and without horns; total length, 6 feet; nose, to insertion of ear, 10
inches; length of ear, 6-1/2 inches; height from forefoot to shoulder,
2 feet 9 inches; tail, 1 foot 3 inches in length; becoming very pale
on the belly and lower parts and white inside the thighs; a black
dorsal ridge of bristly hair extends from the back of the crown to the
tail; nose black; the white spots on various parts of the body nearly
resembling those of the male, only the white stripes on both sides are
more numerous and clearly defined, amounting to twelve or thirteen in
number; tail, rufous above and white below, tipped with black."
[18] It may be remembered that the unidentified antelope shot by
Captain Faulkner on the shore of Lake Nyasa, near Cape Maclear, stood
3 feet 4 inches at the shoulder, whilst the length of its horns was 1
foot 9 inches.
As soon as I had stripped the skins, with the leg-bones still attached,
from my two beautiful specimens, I had them carried, together with the
skulls, to Gugawi's kraal, on the edge of the bush, and there spent the
remainder of the day in preparing them for mounting. Of the meat, which
was all brought in, I sent a couple of haunches over to Mr. Wissels,
and then, after keeping a small piece for myself, gave the remainder to
Gugawi, to divide amongst his people as he thought fit.
Next morning I was up and out in the bush just as day was breaking,
accompanied only by my guide of yesterday and Longman, who, however,
kept some distance behind, in order to allow my guide and myself to
approach our game as noiselessly as possible. We had been creeping
about in the dense jungle for some three hours without having seen
anything, although there was a good deal of fresh spoor about, and
twice we had heard inyalas dash away through the bush without getting a
sight of them, when suddenly my guide crouched to the ground, at the
same time pointing towards a large ant-heap growing out of the dense
scrub, and itself covered with undergrowth. Following the direction
of his arm, I made out a reddish patch not fifteen yards away in the
gloom of the bush; and, taking it for an inyala doe, I fired into it
point-blank, as I required another specimen for mounting. At the shot,
the animal fell, and on creeping up to it, I found that it was a young
male. It was something less in size than a full-grown female, from
which it did not differ in any way in coloration and the number and
distribution of white stripes and spots. It was thus interesting, as
showing that the male inyala changes in general colour from bright red
to dark grey, only losing the rufous and orange tints on the ears and
forehead--which were still conspicuous in the type specimen described
by Mr. Angas--when fully adult.
As it was now getting on for midday, I had the young inyala carried
forthwith to the kraal, where I remained until about four o'clock, then
again sallied forth, and did another two hours' jungle-creeping before
dark. I saw an inyala doe, and could have fired at her, but, thinking
there might have been a male accompanying her, did not care to do so
too hurriedly, and whilst I was straining my eyes peering into the bush
all around her, she either saw or winded me, and bounded off, quite
alone as far as I could make out.
Early the following morning I was again in the bush, and just after
sunrise came on a male inyala close to the river. He was standing
behind a mass of tree stems, with just his tail showing on one side
and part of his head on the other. He was evidently looking at us, and
as I knew he would be off in a moment, giving but little chance of a
shot, I thought I had better try and put a bullet into him through an
interstice amongst the tree stems, where I could see what I took to be
part of his neck. I made a bad shot, however, as my bullet, instead of
passing through the opening, imbedded itself in the wood of one of the
tree stems, and the inyala went off uninjured.
On returning to the kraal, Gugawi proposed to take me to a spot some
few miles higher up the Usutu, where he said there were plenty of
inyalas, whilst at the same time the bush was not so dense as near
his kraal. Being by this time thoroughly sick of crawling about bent
nearly double, I hailed with delight the idea of finding the game I was
seeking in a country where I could walk upright, and visions of inyalas
feeding through open glades passed through my mind--visions, alas,
which were never realised, for in my small experience I never found
these antelopes anywhere except in dense bush. However, I was glad of
the change, and soon had everything ready for a move.
In the afternoon we travelled some five or six miles up the river, and
pitched camp in a bit of jungle near the water's edge. The Usutu river
is here very broad, and reminded me strongly of parts of the Chobi;
but whereas the banks of the latter river, as I knew it in the early
'seventies, abounded in game of many descriptions, from the elephant
downwards, there was not a track to be seen along the Usutu of any
kind of animal with the exception of the inyala. All the wealth of
wild life which Baldwin saw in this same district in 1854 had melted
away before the guns of the native Amatonga hunters; for, be it noted,
this is a country in which but very little game has been killed by
white men. Rhinoceroses, buffaloes, koodoos, waterbucks, impalas,
lions,--all are gone, the only game left being the inyalas, which owe
their preservation to the dense jungles in which they live; and even
they are being rapidly killed off, as the natives are always after
them, lying in wait for them in the paths made by the hippopotamuses or
creeping stealthily through the bush in their pursuit.
Curiously enough, in these thickets, where inyalas are so numerous,
there are very few bushbucks, although the surroundings are in every
respect suited to their requirements. I can only account for the
scarcity of the bushbucks, where inyalas are plentiful, by supposing
that the latter animals will not tolerate the former--considering them
too nearly akin to themselves to make good neighbours; for a male
bushbuck might be excused, I think, for making love to an inyala doe,
which scarcely differs from one of his own females in any way except
size, and that probably not to a sufficient degree to stop his advances
during the rutting season; which, of course, would be resented by
the male inyala, and the latter being the more powerful animal, has
been able to drive his rival out of his preserves. If jealousy is not
answerable for the scarcity of bushbucks in these jungles where inyalas
are so plentiful, I fail to understand why the former animals should
be so numerous lower down the river under exactly similar conditions,
except that there there are no inyalas.
In the open expanse of water, some half a mile in breadth, just
opposite our camp, several hippopotamuses were grunting and playing
about on our arrival, and as long as we remained here there were always
some of these animals in sight. In the evening I went out after inyala,
but though I saw plenty of spoor, I did not catch sight of one of the
animals themselves. Soon after dark a heavy thunderstorm came up from
the south, and continued with much lightning and torrents of rain till
long after midnight. Having neither a tent nor a waterproof sheet, I,
like my native companions, of course got soaking wet; and we had to sit
shivering in our drenched blankets until daylight, as the heavy rains
had put our fires out and we could not get another alight, everything
being wet.
Soon after dawn, however, we managed to get a fire under way, and
I then had a cup of warm coffee. Just as the sun was rising I went
out into the dripping bush, and returned to camp dry and warm before
midday. In spite of what Gugawi had said as to the bush being more
open round this camp than near his own kraal, I found but little
difference, and should describe all the bush in which I hunted on the
Usutu river as dense jungle. In the course of the morning I just caught
a glimpse of an inyala--a male evidently by his colour--but failed to
get a shot at him. I also saw a large number of the beautiful crested
guinea-fowls, which in this district seem to be more numerous than the
common South African species. During the heat of the day I remained at
our bivouac, and, as the sun was intensely hot, managed to thoroughly
dry all my belongings, which had got so wet during the previous night's
rain. In the evening I again went out into the bush, and just at dusk
caught sight of the hind-quarters of an antelope amongst the thick
scrub ahead of me. The light was fast failing, and although I felt sure
it was an inyala, as there were apparently no other kinds of antelopes
in the district, yet I could not in the least tell whether it was a
male or female, but, hoping for the best, fired, and saw nothing more.
On forcing my way through the scrub to where the animal had been when I
fired, I found a fine inyala doe lying on the ground, just on the point
of death, the bullet having struck her in the left thigh and passed
through the whole length of her body into the cavity of the chest.
Although disappointed that it was not a male, I skinned her carefully
for mounting; and she now forms part of the fine collection of South
African mammalia which is in the Museum at Cape Town.
It would be but tedious reading were I to continue to describe in
detail my further bush-crawling experiences in search of inyalas.
Suffice it to say that, on October 1 and 2, I secured two more fine
males, whose heads I preserved for my own collection. Although I should
have liked to have got a fourth male for the South African Museum, I
did not think it prudent to remain any longer in my camp on the edge of
a swamp, where I knew the air must be reeking with malarial poison, as,
besides the exhalations from the marsh, the ground (from which I was
only separated at nights by a little dry grass and a blanket) had been
soaked to the depth of two feet by the recent rain, thus rendering the
conditions more than usually unhealthy. The weather, too, was now again
looking very threatening, and I did not relish the idea of any further
lying out in the rain; as I knew, from former experience, that I should
probably have to pay for the wettings I had already suffered, by some
attacks of fever--a disease from which I had been entirely exempt for
seven years, but the poison of which I knew was still in my blood, and
would be likely to be again stirred into activity by my recent exposure
to unhealthy conditions.
Hence, on Saturday, October 3, I packed up my things and returned to
Gugawi's kraal, walking on in the afternoon to Mr. Wissels's store. At
Gugawi's I met an Englishman, who informed me that he had come down
from Barberton, and was travelling about amongst the Amatonga, buying
skins of wild cats, jackals, etc., which he hoped to sell again at a
profit to the Kafirs working in the mines in the Transvaal. He seemed
much surprised when I told him that I had only come to Amatongaland
in order to shoot an inyala, and frequently remarked in the course of
our conversation, "Well, I'm ----; so you've come all this ---- way to
shoot a ---- buck." He also informed me that he was not very well, as
he had been "on the burst" for the last three days; but this confidence
was superfluous, as no one could have approached within ten yards of
him without realising his condition.
On my arrival at the store I was disappointed to find that Mr. Wissels
was absent, having again returned to Delagoa Bay for another cargo
of maize. Had he been at home, I should have endeavoured to obtain a
specimen of Livingstone's antelope--a species which I have never shot,
and which Mr. Wissels had informed me was numerous in most of the
jungles near his store. These little animals are very similar in habits
to the diminutive blue buck of Natal, and as they inhabit dense bush,
are not often shot, except by driving, and Mr. Wissels had promised
that when I returned to his station he would collect a lot of Kafirs
and get up a drive for me. However, as I did not know when he would
return, and was anxious to get back to Kimberley as soon as possible
now that I had accomplished the main object of my journey, I did not
care about waiting for him, but determined to get on as quickly as
possible. Had Mr. Wissels been at home I should probably have returned
to Delagoa Bay by boat, but now I had the prospect of an eighty-mile
walk. I had no difficulty in getting carriers, as Gugawi's men, who had
brought my things to the store, and with whom I had been associated
for the last week, volunteered to go on with me to Delagoa Bay; and it
pleased me very much to find that they did not insist on being paid
beforehand, but trusted to my honour to deal fairly with them.
On the evening of the day on which I returned to Mr. Wissels's store,
the weather looked very unsettled; but on the following morning all
signs of rain had cleared off, and the sun rose red and fiery in a
cloudless sky. I got away early, and on the evening of the third day
slept within sight of the lights amongst the shipping in Delagoa Bay.
During those three days the heat had been intense, and in those eighty
miles I never put my foot on a piece of firm ground, but plodded
painfully through deep white sand, like the soft sand of the sea-shore.
Indeed, all this flat country to the south of Delagoa Bay must once
have been at the bottom of the sea--from which it has been upheaved
probably at no very distant time, geologically speaking, as I noticed
that the patches of sandy soil which were under cultivation were full
of oyster and other sea-shells. Water seemed to be everywhere close
below the surface, but was not good--having an unhealthy, slimy taste,
and making bad tea. Indeed, except in the actual stream of the Usutu
river, I never tasted anything but swamp water during this trip. As I
tramped along mile after mile in the deep sand and beneath the blazing
sun, I could not but think regretfully of my elephant-hunting days of
over twenty years before, when I used to do the same sort of work day
after day and month after month without feeling it, and got up every
morning without an ache or pain, fresh and ready for the next day's
work. But one cannot last for ever; and on this long weary tramp there
were moments when I would have given a good deal for a horse, or even a
donkey, and on the first day's walk the sun gave me a bad headache.
On the evening of the first and the morning of the second day we passed
through some quite uninhabited country, and here I shot two duiker
antelopes and a steinbuck. I also saw some quite fresh elephant spoor,
and just caught a glimpse of a little Livingstone's antelope, whose
local name is "schlengarn," in a patch of thick bush. The country was
looking fresh and green, with the sprouting grass after the recent
heavy rains; and hundreds of beetles were now running over the sand,
which was a good deal more than warm. Indeed, it was so hot that I
think a baboon would have hesitated to sit down on it.
But my weary tramp came to an end at last, and early on the morning of
October 7 I crossed the Bay of Delagoa to the town of Lourenço Marques,
and, thanks to the kind assistance of Mr. Edixhoven, got all my
specimens packed and conveyed on board the _Pembroke Castle_ the same
day, for transport to England, where they duly arrived in very good
order.
The same evening I left Delagoa Bay by train for the Transvaal, and
finally reached Kimberley on October 10. Here I had a slight attack of
malarial fever--a matter of a few hours only--succeeded by two more in
Cape Town, and a final attack on board ship on my way to England. But
these attacks were very slight and only lasted for a few hours at a
time, and I can only say, with Drummond, that ample amends have been
made for any little inconveniences I may have suffered, by the pleasure
of the thought that I have not only added a pair of inyala heads to my
own private collection, but have also enriched our National Museum of
Natural History with two beautiful specimens of this rare and handsome
antelope.