to charge.

During the following ten days we made many similar attempts to get a
charge and always with nearly the same results. Once or twice we got
within thirty yards before they finally turned tail after a number of
feints that looked much like the beginning of a nasty charge. It was
always intensely thrilling work because there was the likelihood that we
might get a charge in spite of the fact that a dozen or so previous
experiences had failed to precipitate one.

In several cases the first rush of the rhino was toward us, but instead
of continuing, he would soon swing about and make off, four times as
badly scared as we were. It seemed as though these preliminary rushes
toward us were efforts to verify the location of danger in order to
determine the right direction for escape. In all, we made between
fifteen and twenty different attempts on different rhinos to get a
charge, but with always practically the same result, yet with always the
same thrill of excitement and uncertainty.

[Drawing: _The End of the Charge_]

Comprehensive statistics on a rhino's charges are hard to obtain. The
district commissioner at Embo told me that he had been ordered to reduce
the number of rhinos in his district in the interest of public safety
and that he had killed thirty-five in all. Out of this number five
charged him. That would indicate that one rhino in seven will charge.
Captain Dickinson, in his book, _Big Game Shooting on the Equator_,
tells of a rhino that charged him so viciously that he threw down his
bedding roll and the rhino tossed it and trampled it with great
emphasis, after which it triumphantly trotted away, elated probably in
the thought that it had wiped out its enemy. A number of fatalities are
on record to prove that the rhino is a dangerous beast at times, and so
I must conclude that the rhino experiences we had were exceedingly lucky
ones, and perhaps exceptional ones in that respect.

In only one instance was it necessary for us to kill a rhino and even
then it was done more in the interest of photography than of urgent
necessity. On our game licenses we were each allowed to kill two rhinos,
and as I wanted, one of the Tana River variety it was arranged that I
should try to get the first big one with good horns. After a hunt of
several hours we found two of them together out on the slope of a long
hill. Our glasses showed that one of them was quite large and equipped
with a splendid front horn nearly