as
triumphantly over.

We were now within twenty yards (they were standing starboard side on),
and I prepared to get my picture. To do so I would either have to step
quietly out into sight, trusting to the shadow and the slowness of my
movements to escape observation, or hold the camera above the bush,
directing it by guess work. It was a little difficult to decide. I knew
what I OUGHT to do--

Without the slightest premonitory warning those two brutes snorted and
whirled in their tracks to stand facing in our direction. After the dead
stillness they made a tremendous row, what with the jerky suddenness of
their movements, their loud snorts, and the avalanche of echoing stones
and boulders they started down the hill.

This was the magnificent opportunity. At this point I should boldly
have stepped out from behind my bush, levelled my trusty 3A, and coolly
snapped the beasts, "charging at fifteen yards." Then, if B.'s and F.'s
shots went absolutely true, or if the brutes didn't happen to smash the
camera as well as me, I, or my executors as the case might be, would
have had a fine picture.

But I didn't. I dropped that expensive 3A Special on some hard rocks,
and grabbed my rifle from Memba Sasa. If you want really to know why, go
confront your motor car at fifteen or twenty paces, multiply him by two,
and endow him with an eagerly malicious disposition.

They advanced several yards, halted, faced us for perhaps five or
six seconds, uttered snort, whirled with the agility of polo ponies,
departed at a swinging trot and with surprising agility along the steep
side hill.

I recovered the camera, undamaged, and we continued our climb.

The top of the mesa was disappointing as far as game was concerned. It
was covered all over with red stones, round, and as large as a man's
head. Thornbushes found some sort of sustenance in the interstices.

But we had gained to a magnificent view. Below us lay the narrow flat,
then the winding jungle of our river, then long rolling desert country,
gray with thorn scrub, sweeping upward to the base of castellated buttes
and one tremendous riven cliff mountain, dropping over the horizon to a
very distant blue range. Behind us eight or ten miles away was the low
ridge through which our journey had come. The mesa on which we stood
broke back at right angles to admit another stream flowing into our own.
Beyond this stream were rolling hills, and scrub country, the hint of
blue peaks an