SOME CURIOUS HUNTING EXPERIENCES
Contrast between Rhodesia to-day and long ago--The old days the
best--White rhinoceroses and elephants drinking--A night on the
Sikumi river--Abundance of big game--A white rhinoceros visits my
camp--My queerest experience--Meet with two black rhinoceroses--A
near approach--Rhinoceros knocked down--Apparently dead--Commence
to cut it up--Rhinoceros regains consciousness--Gets on its
legs--And runs off--Another curious experience--Buffaloes and
tse-tse flies--Meeting with lioness--Hammer of rifle lost--Bushmen
sent in search of it--Lions met with--Lion and lioness stand close
to me--The chance of a lifetime--Rifle misses fire--Lions run
off--Lion again seen--Rifle useless--Throw it at the lion--The
irony of fate.
As I read almost weekly, in one or other of the papers devoted to South
Africa, some account of all the marvellous changes which have recently
been brought about, through the energy and intelligence of Britons,
in the spacious country now known as Rhodesia, my thoughts often go
back to the days when I first wandered and hunted through that land of
stirring memories.
That was nearly forty years ago now, and Matabeleland was less
known and more inaccessible then than is any part of Central Africa
to-day, for at that time not a yard of railway had been laid from any
coast town of the Cape Colony or Natal towards the interior of the
country. Lo Bengula, a powerful chief of Zulu race, had but recently
been elected king of the Matabele, and savagery seemed so firmly
established throughout all the territory between the Limpopo and the
Zambesi that I never dreamt I should live to see the destruction of
that great chief's far-reaching power, and the defeat and dispersal
of his brave but barbarous tribesmen, to be quickly followed by the
founding of a European town near the site of the old native "great
place," and the building of a railway through the wilderness to the
north.
Ah! but the old days were the best, after all--or at any rate I think
so. The traveller by rail to the Victoria Falls will journey at his
ease, it is true, in a saloon carriage, with plenty to eat and drink,
through seemingly endless wastes of low forest and scrubby bush,
and will probably think it a terribly monotonous and uninteresting
country; but no man will ever again sit by a camp fire near one of
the little rivers the railway will cross, eating prime pieces of fat
elephant's heart, roasted on a forked stick, nor watch the great white
rhinoceroses coming to drink just before dark, nor lie and listen to
herd after herd of elephants drinking and bathing in the river near
their camp. On one particular night in 1873 which I shall never forget,
the splashing and trumpeting of troop after troop of hot and thirsty
elephants was kept up from soon after dark till long past midnight.
This was at the little river Sikumi, which the traveller of to-day
will cross by an iron bridge. There was no monotony about the country
between Bulawayo and the Victoria Falls in those days. The abundance
of big game--elephants, black and white rhinoceroses, giraffes,
buffaloes, zebras, and many varieties of antelopes--made it always
interesting alike to the hunter and the lover of nature. As I think of
my early wanderings through those once well-stocked hunting-grounds
in the days when I made my living by shooting elephants, I can recall
many interesting experiences, some of a decidedly exciting nature,
others only curious. I never had any narrow escapes from rhinoceroses,
although I encountered numbers of these prehistoric-looking animals,
but I do not think that the black rhinoceros of the interior of South
Africa was ever of so aggressive a nature as he appears to be in many
districts of East Africa to-day, though a wounded one was always likely
to become savage.
One night in 1873, when camped on the borders of the hills which skirt
the southern bank of the Zambesi to the east of the Victoria Falls, a
white rhinoceros came to inspect my camp about an hour after dark. I
had had my evening meal, and was sitting talking by a cheery log fire
to one of my native attendants--for I had no white companion--when
we heard a rhinoceros snort not far away, and soon afterwards, by
the light of a young moon, we perceived one of these animals slowly
approaching our camp. I told my boys to keep quite quiet, and we then
sat watching our visitor. It advanced very slowly, holding its great
square nose close to the ground, and every now and then stopped and
snorted loudly. At last it was within twenty yards of our fires, and
seemed determined to come closer still. Several of my Kafirs had by
this time crept round to the back of the bushes which sheltered our
camp and made for the nearest tree, whilst my favourite gun-carrier put
my big four-bore elephant gun into my hands, and begged me to shoot the
inquisitive beast before it charged in amongst us.
But in those days I was hunting elephants for a living, and as we were
camped near a favourite drinking-place of these animals, and a shot
in the night might have disturbed a herd approaching the water, I was
determined not to fire at the rhinoceros if I could possibly avoid
doing so.
However, something had to be done to stop it, as I was afraid that if
it came any nearer the smell of meat might excite it, and cause
it to run amuck through the camp; so, plucking a good-sized piece of
wood from the fire, I threw it with all my strength, and, just missing
the rhinoceros's great ugly head, hit it on the neck or shoulder, and
covered it with a shower of sparks. As the blazing brand fell to the
ground, the rhinoceros backed a step or two and then seemed to be
sniffing at it. At this moment my gun-carrier hurled another lump of
burning wood at our visitor, with a somewhat better aim than mine,
for he struck it full in the face--apparently right on the front
horn--and lit up its head with a cataract of sparks. This was more than
the rhinoceros could stand, and its curiosity being evidently fully
satisfied, it spun round with a snort, and trotted off into the night,
nor did it ever visit our camp again.
[Illustration: "MY GUN-CARRIER HURLED ANOTHER LUMP OF BURNING WOOD AT
OUR VISITOR."]
But the queerest experience I think I ever had with a rhinoceros was
one which happened not far from the scene of the last adventure, and
during the same year 1873.
Not having come across elephants for some time, my Kafirs and I were
just out of meat--for in those days I seldom shot other animals as
long as I had elephant meat to eat, for fear of disturbing the more
valuable game--when we came one day on the fresh tracks of two black
rhinoceroses, and after following the spoor for a short distance,
suddenly sighted the animals themselves lying down in a rather open
grassy piece of country. We all crouched down instantly, and as the
rhinoceroses never moved, and the wind was favourable, it was soon
evident that they had neither seen nor heard us, and were still quite
unconscious of danger. Taking one of my heavy, clumsy, old four-bore
muzzle-loading elephant guns--the only weapons I then possessed--I at
once commenced to creep slowly towards them through the grass, which
was not very long.
I had approached to within twenty yards or so of the sleeping animals,
and had just raised myself to a sitting position for a shot from behind
a small bush, when one of them, which I saw from the thickness of its
horns was the bull, stood up, and commenced to walk slowly towards my
very inadequate shelter. I do not think that it had any suspicion of my
presence, but it was soon within ten yards of the little bush behind
which I sat, and as it was still walking slowly towards me it was
necessary to do something.
As its head was held in such a position that it covered its whole
chest, I resolved to try and fire so as just to miss its horns, and
strike it in the front of the head above the eyes. Even if I did not
succeed in doing this, but hit one of its horns instead, which was
very likely, considering the clumsy weapon I was using, I thought that
the shock caused by the heavy bullet would be sure to discompose my
opponent sufficiently to give me time to run back to the Kafirs and get
my second gun before it thought of charging.
When I fired, the rhinoceros's legs seemed to give way under it, and it
just sank to the ground, and then, rolling on to its side, lay quite
still, and, as I thought, dead. "Tutu," shouted the Kafirs from behind
me, meaning "It's done for," and all of them came running up, the cow
having jumped up and made off immediately I fired at her companion.
We now all walked together to where the fallen animal lay apparently
quite dead. My four-ounce round bullet had made a large hole in the
front of its head, into which I and several of the Kafirs pushed our
fingers as far as they would go. We then went to the nearest tree,
some sixty or seventy yards away, and after resting my two elephant
guns--the one still unloaded--against its stem, and placing all our
scanty baggage on the ground in its shade, returned to cut up what we
believed to be the carcase of a dead animal.
One of my Kafirs, by name Soga, a big strong Makalaka, at once plunged
his assegai into the body of the prostrate rhinoceros and commenced to
cut through the thick skin, pulling the blade of the assegai towards
him with a sawing motion. This incision should have extended from near
the top of the back behind the shoulder-blade to the bottom of the
chest, and would have been the first step in peeling the whole hide
from the upper surface of the body, preparatory to disembowelling the
carcase and cutting up the meat; but when Soga had made a cut about two
and a half feet long in its side, the limbs of the rhinoceros began to
move spasmodically, and it suddenly raised its head and brought it down
again with a thump on the ground.
From that moment it commenced to struggle frantically, and was
evidently fast regaining consciousness. I shouted to Soga to try and
stab it in the heart before it got on its legs; but as he only made a
very feeble attempt to do so, I ran up, and snatching the assegai from
him, endeavoured to stab the struggling animal to death myself. But it
was now fast regaining strength, and with every effort to rise it threw
up its head and brought it down on the ground again with a thump.
I managed to plunge the heavy assegai through the cut in its skin and
deep into its side, but with a sudden spasmodic movement it broke the
shaft in two, leaving a short piece attached to the blade sticking
in its body. In another moment it was standing on its legs, but kept
reeling about like a drunken man. I now ran to the tree where the guns
had been left, and taking the loaded one, aimed a shot at the still
staggering rhinoceros, but, as not infrequently happened in the old
muzzle-loading days, it missed fire I quickly put on a fresh cap, but
as that missed fire too, I concluded that the nipple had got stopped up
in some way, and so took up the gun with which I had originally wounded
the rhinoceros, and commenced to reload it in frantic haste.
Just as I got the bullet rammed down, however, and before I could
put the cap on the nipple, the rhinoceros, which all this time had
been making a series of short runs, first in one direction and then
in another, but had always been quite close to us, started off in a
straight line, putting on more pace at every step; and although we ran
as hard as we could, we never overtook it, and I did not fire at it
again. My bullet no doubt passed above the animal's brain-pan, and must
have lodged in the muscles of its neck, only stunning it temporarily;
but it really seemed to be absolutely dead for so long a time after
falling to the ground, that its recovery and eventual escape, after
receiving a four-ounce bullet through the upper part of the head, and
having a gash cut in its side at least two feet long, not to mention
a deep stab in the region of the heart, is, I think, one of the most
remarkable incidents I have ever witnessed during a long experience of
African hunting.
Another equally curious, but far more exasperating experience occurred
to me early in May 1877, when I was hunting with two friends, Dorehill
and Kingsley, on one of the tributaries of the river Daka, about sixty
miles to the south of the Victoria Falls of the Zambesi. At the time of
which I am writing buffaloes literally swarmed all over this part of
the country, and it was in order to shoot a few of these animals and
lay in a supply of good fat meat, that we had left our waggons standing
at a place known as the Baobab vley, and made an excursion to the east,
necessarily on foot because of the tse-tse fly. Both buffaloes and
tse-tse flies, I may say, ceased to exist in this district long long
ago.
One evening I was coming home, and within a mile of camp--all my Kafirs
and Bushmen carrying heavy loads of meat cut from two fat buffalo cows
which I had shot during the day--when, whilst we were passing through a
thick patch of scrubby thorn bush, a shot was fired a short distance to
our right, immediately followed by a loud purring growl; then all was
quiet again.
Calling to my Bushman gun-carrier to keep close, I ran in the direction
of the sound, and soon came upon Kingsley quite alone and looking
rather scared. Having a sore heel, he had remained in camp; but it
appeared that having seen a buffalo bull crossing the open valley on
the other side of which our camp was situated, he had gone after it
all by himself. Being quite strange to the country and knowing nothing
about hunting, Kingsley had lost sight of the buffalo amongst the thorn
scrub, and not being able to follow its tracks, was making his way back
to camp, when he suddenly saw an animal moving through the bush about
twenty yards ahead of him, which he took to be an impala antelope, as
he could only see it very indistinctly. He immediately fired at it
through the scrub, when, to his horror, a lioness thrust her head into
the open, and staring fixedly at him, gave a low growl. Kingsley said
he stood quite still, but was afraid to reload his rifle or make any
movement for fear of further exciting the savage-looking animal. The
latter, however, after having gazed steadily at him for a few moments,
turned and trotted off.
We now examined the place where the lioness had been standing when
Kingsley fired at her, but could find no blood, and I have no doubt
that he missed her. We then tried to track her; but her soft feet had
left so little trace on the hard ground that even my Bushmen could not
follow it, so we gave it up and all returned to camp together.
As I took my rifle from the Bushman who had been carrying it, I saw
that the hammer was gone. This rifle was a single-barrelled ten-bore,
with under lever action and a hammer. On examining it, I found that the
screw that had held the hammer in place on the tumbler had evidently
worked loose and fallen out, with the result that the hammer had
dropped off. Now I felt sure that just before I had heard Kingsley's
shot I had seen the hammer on the rifle, and believed that it must have
fallen off whilst we were running a distance of not more than four
hundred yards. I was very much annoyed at the prospect of having my
favourite rifle put out of action indefinitely, although the Bushmen
were confident that they would be able to find the lost hammer the
next day. They said they would follow the tracks of my gun-carrier
and myself, where we had been running, inch by inch on their hands
and knees, burning the scanty grass as they went along. In spite of
their confidence, I must say I had very little hope that they would be
successful, and lay down to sleep that night with a heavy heart, for I
thought that my well-tried and favourite rifle would have to be laid on
the shelf for the remainder of the year.
On the following day, after having sent my gun-carrier and two other
Bushmen to look for the hammer of my rifle, Dorehill and I went out
hunting, leaving Kingsley in charge of the camp. On this occasion I
took with me, in place of my ten-bore, a single-barrelled eight-bore
weapon, which I had often used before, as I had only lately sold it to
Dorehill. This rifle was fitted with a hair trigger, which one set by
pushing the trigger forwards. I knew that my friend had taken the lock
of this rifle to pieces, and cleaned and oiled it just before we left
the waggons, but I did not know that he had done anything more than
this. It afterwards turned out, however, that he had, as he said, "just
touched the detenter" with a fine file, but unfortunately had taken
enough off it to throw the mechanism connected with the hair trigger
out of order. This, however, I only found out to my sorrow later on.
About two hours after we had left camp, we emerged from the open
forest, with which most of the country was covered, upon a broad open
valley, devoid of bush, but covered with a thick growth of yellow grass
some four feet high. This open valley was bounded on its further side
by a rocky ridge some twenty feet in height, which formed the edge of
a level expanse of country covered with small scattered trees, and a
very scanty growth of fine grass, of quite a different character to
that growing in the valley below. Down the centre of the open ground
ran a small stream of water, a tributary of the Daka river. We had just
crossed this stream, and were within fifty yards of the steep ridge
that bounded the further side of the valley, when two of our Kafirs,
who had been after a honey-bird, and who were coming diagonally towards
us through the long grass, and had just reached the stream about one
hundred yards below us, suddenly shouted out "Isilouan, isilouan!"
("Lions, lions!"), and came running towards us. Seizing the eight-bore
rifle from the shoulder of the Kafir who was carrying it just behind
me, I ran towards them, calling out, "Where are they? Which way have
they gone?" "They jumped out of the bed of the stream," they replied,
"and went forward through the grass towards the ridge."
I did not wait to hear anything more, but ran to the ridge as hard as I
could, closely followed by the Kafir who had been carrying my rifle.
Climbing quickly to the top, I turned and looked eagerly for the lions,
which I had hoped to be able to see from my vantage-ground in the
grass below me. But I saw nothing, and so began to walk quickly along
the edge of the low bluff, keeping my eyes as wide open as possible.
Suddenly I heard a slight noise a little ahead of me, as of a small
stone being moved; and turning my eyes in the direction of the sound,
saw a lioness just emerging from the grass at the foot of the ridge.
She was on a little game-path, and evidently intending to come up to
the higher ground where I was standing; so, whispering the one word
"aima" ("stand") to the Kafir behind me--a good staunch boy--I remained
perfectly still, scarcely daring to breathe. The lioness walked slowly
upwards and was immediately followed by a fine lion. One behind the
other, these two magnificent brutes strolled leisurely up the steep
path until they stood on the level ground above.
Just as they came to the top, the lion walked partially behind the
lioness, whose hind-quarters then covered most of his head and
shoulders. I don't think I was more than from twenty to thirty yards
away from them, and there was not a bush or anything else between
us but a scanty crop of short grass less than a foot in height, yet
neither of them seemed at first to notice anything. I, on my part,
remained absolutely motionless, not wishing to fire until I could get a
clear view of the lion. After they had walked broadside on to me, for
perhaps fifteen yards from the edge of the bluff, the lioness stopped,
and turning her head, looked towards where I and the Kafir stood. The
lion took another step or two forwards, and then also stopped and
looked at us. They were standing exactly broadside on to me, close
alongside of one another, the lion perhaps a foot in advance, so that
he looked at us from just beyond his companion's head.
Now was my opportunity, and did ever hunter have such a chance before,
I wonder? The eight-bore elephant rifle I carried could certainly have
driven a bullet through two lions, and had I hit the lioness in the
middle of the shoulder--and at thirty yards I could hardly have helped
doing so--the bullet would have passed clean through her, and caught
the lion just behind the shoulders, an equally fatal shot, as it would
have passed through the big blood-vessels of both lungs. My rifle was
already on full cock and the hair trigger set, and, raising it to my
shoulder, I took a cool and careful aim and pulled the trigger. Click
went the hammer, and just came down to the half-cock. This performance
I repeated at least half-a-dozen times, but always with the same result.
All this time the lions stood perfectly still, watching me quietly and
in rather a sleepy kind of way. Then the lioness walked forwards again,
closely followed by her companion, but after taking a few steps they
broke into a trot, which soon changed to a heavy lumbering canter. I
ran after them as hard as I could, but soon lost sight of them amongst
some small bushy shrubs.
Running into and through these bushes, I found myself close to the edge
of the bluff again which skirted the open grass valley, for the lions
had run round in a half-circle. Feeling sure they had descended to the
lower ground, I ran on to the edge of the ridge, and at once saw the
lion standing just below me at the foot of the bluff, and close to the
edge of the long grass. The lioness I could not see. I don't think the
lion was ten yards away from me. He had evidently heard me coming, and
stood quite still looking at me whilst I tried three times to fire at
him, but the hammer would not go beyond the half-cock.
Then realising my helplessness, and mad with rage and mortification, I
caught my useless rifle by the barrel with both hands and threw it at
the lion below me. It clattered down amongst the stones close to him,
causing him to throw up his tail with a loud purr and disappear into
the long grass. The rifle, though somewhat bruised and dinted, was not
much the worse for its fall. I think this episode is about the worst
piece of bad luck I have ever met with. No such chance of shooting
two lions at one shot had ever been offered to me before or has ever
occurred since, and it was surely the very irony of fate that this
unique opportunity should have fallen to my lot on the one and only day
when my favourite old ten-bore was useless to me, for the Bushmen not
only found the hammer which I had lost the day before but the little
screw that held it on the tumbler as well!