these things it was noon. We ate lunch. The
various members of the party decided to do various things. I elected to
go out with McMillan while he killed a wildebeeste, and I am very glad I
did. It was a most astonishing performance.

You must imagine us driving out the gate in a buckboard behind four
small but lively white Abyssinian mules. In the front seat were Michael,
the Hottentot driver, and McMillan's Somali gunbearer. In the rear seat
were McMillan and myself, while a small black syce perched precariously
behind. Our rifles rested in a sling before us. So we jogged out on the
road to Long Juju, examining with a critical eye the herds of game to
right and left of us. The latter examined us, apparently, with an eye as
critical. Finally, in a herd of zebra, we espied a lone wildebeeste.

The wildebeeste is the Jekyll and Hyde of the animal kingdom. His
usual and familiar habit is that of a heavy, sluggish animal, like
our vanished bison. He stands solid and inert, his head down; he plods
slowly forward in single file, his horns swinging, each foot planted
deliberately. In short, he is the personification of dignity, solid
respectability, gravity of demeanour. But then all of a sudden, at any
small interruption, he becomes the giddiest of created beings. Up goes
his head and tail, he buck jumps, cavorts, gambols, kicks up his heels,
bounds stiff-legged, and generally performs like an irresponsible
infant. To see a whole herd at once of these grave and reverend
seigneurs suddenly blow up into such light-headed capers goes far to
destroy one's faith in the stability of institutions.

Also the wildebeeste is not misnamed. He is a conservative, and he sees
no particular reason for allowing his curiosity to interfere with his
preconceived beliefs. The latter are distrustful. Therefore he and his
females and his young-I should say small-depart when one is yet far
away. I say small, because I do not believe that any wildebeeste is ever
young. They do not resemble calves, but are exact replicas of the big
ones, just as Niobe's daughters are in nothing childlike, but merely
smaller women.

When we caught sight of this lone wildebeeste among the zebra, I
naturally expected that we would pull up the buckboard, descend, and
approach to within some sort of long range. Then we would open fire.
Barring luck, the wildebeeste would thereupon depart "wilder and
beestier than ever," as John McCutcheon has it. Not at all! Michael,