re beautiful to behold. As it did so, I happened to look round at
Harry, and perceived to my astonishment that he had got his rifle to his
shoulder.

"'You young donkey!' I exclaimed, 'surely you are not going to'--and
just at that moment the rifle went off.

"And then I think I saw what was in its way one of the most wonderful
things I ever remember in my hunting experience. The koodoo was at the
moment in the air, clearing a pile of stones with its fore-legs tucked
up underneath it. All of an instant the legs stretched themselves out
in a spasmodic fashion, it lit on them, and they doubled up beneath it.
Down went the noble buck, down upon his head. For a moment he seemed to
be standing on his horns, his hind-legs high in the air, and then over
he rolled and lay still.

"'Great Heavens!' I said, 'why, you've hit him! He's dead.'

"As for Harry, he said nothing, but merely looked scared, as well he
might, for such a marvellous, I may say such an appalling and ghastly
fluke it has never been my lot to witness. A man, let alone a boy,
might have fired a thousand such shots without ever touching the object;
which, mind you, was springing and bounding over rocks quite five
hundred yards away; and here this lad--taking a snap shot, and merely
allowing for speed and elevation by instinct, for he did not put up his
sights--had knocked the bull over as dead as a door-nail. Well, I made
no further remark, as the occasion was too solemn for talking, but
merely led the way to where the koodoo had fallen. There he lay,
beautiful and quite still; and there, high up, about half-way down his
neck, was a neat round hole. The bullet had severed the spinal marrow,
passing through the vertebrae and away on the other side.

"It was already evening when, having cut as much of the best meat as we
could carry from the bull, and tied a red handkerchief and some tufts of
grass to his spiral horns, which, by the way, must have been nearly
five feet in length, in the hope of keeping the jackals and aasvoegels
(vultures) from him, we finally got back to camp, to find Pharaoh, who
was getting rather anxious at our absence, ready to greet us with the
pleasing intelligence that another ox was sick. But even this dreadful
bit of intelligence could not dash Harry's spirits; the fact of the
matter being, incredible as it may appear, I do verily believe that in
his heart of hearts he set down the death of the koodoo to the credit
of his own skill.