and it was towards their
return that the thoughts of all were bent.

Hendrik advised "creasing," which means sending a bullet through the
upper part of the neck near the withers, and by this means a quagga can
be knocked over and captured. The shot, if properly directed, does not
kill the animal. It soon recovers, and may be easily "broken," though
its spirit is generally broken at the same time. It is never "itself
again." Hendrik understood the mode of "creasing." He had seen it
practised by the boer-hunters. He knew the spot where the bullet should
hit. He believed he could do it easily enough.

Hans considered the "creasing" too cruel a mode. They might kill many
quaggas before obtaining one that was hit in the proper place. Besides
there would be a waste of powder and bullets--a thing to be considered.
Why could they not snare the animals? He had heard of nooses being set
for animals as large as the quaggas, and of many being caught in that
manner.

Hendrik did not think the idea of snaring a good one. They might get one
in that way--the foremost of the drove; but all the others, seeing the
leader caught, would gallop off and return no more to the vley; and
where would they set their snare for a second? It might be a long time
before they should find another watering-place of these animals; whereas
they might stalk and crease them upon the plains at any time.

Swartboy now put in his plan. It was the pit-fall. That was the way by
which Bushmen most generally caught large animals, and Swartboy
perfectly understood how to construct a pit for quaggas.

Hendrik saw objections to this, very similar to those he had urged
against the snare. The foremost of the quaggas might be caught, but the
others would not be fools enough to walk into the pit--after their
leader had fallen in and laid the trap open. They, of course, would
gallop off, and never come back that way again.

If it could be done at night, Hendrik admitted, the thing might be
different. In the darkness several might rush in before catching the
alarm. But no--the quaggas had always come to drink in day-time--one
only could be trapped, and then the others alarmed would keep away.

There would have been reason in what Hendrik said, but for a remarkable
fact which the field-cornet himself had observed when the quaggas came
to the lake to drink. It was that the animals had invariably entered the
water at one point, and gone out at another. It was of course