Sometimes M'zooba would go afield, leaving the quietude of the creek and the pool, which was her own territory, for the more adventurous life of the river, and here one day she lay, the whole of her body submerged and only her wicked eyes within an eighth of an inch of the water's surface, when a timorous young roebuck came picking a cautious way through the forest across the open plantations to the water's edge. He stopped from time to time apprehensively, trembling in every limb at the slightest sound, looking this way and that, then taking a few more steps and again searching the cruel world for danger before he reached the water's edge. Then, after a final look round, he lowered his soft muzzle to the cool waters. Swift as lightning the Green One flashed her long snout out of the water, and gripped the tender head of the buck. Ruthlessly she pulled, dragging the struggling deer after her till first its neck and then its shoulders, then finally the last frantic waving stump of its white tail went under the dark waters. Out in midstream a white little boat was moving steadily up the river and on the awning-shaded bridge an indignant young man witnessed the tragedy. The Green One had her larder under a large shelving rock half a dozen feet beneath the water. Into this cavity her long hard nose flung her dead victim, and her four powerful hands covered the entrance to the water cave with sand and rock. More than satisfied with her morning's work, the Green One came to the surface of the water to bask in the glowing warmth of the morning sunlight. She took a survey upon the world, made up of low-lying shores and a hot blue sky. She saw a river, broad and oily, and a strange white object which she had seen often before smoking towards her. And that was the last thing she ever saw; for Bones, on the bridge of the _Zaire_, squinted along the sights of his Express and pressed the trigger. Struck in the head by an explosive bullet, the Green One went out in a flurry of stormy water. "Thus perish all rotten old crocodiles," said Bones, immensely pleased with himself, and he placed the rifle on the rack. "What the devil are you shooting at, so early in the morning?" asked Hamilton. He came out in his pyjamas, sun helmet on his head, pliant mosquito boots reaching to his knees. "A crocodile, sir," said Bones. "Why waste good ammunition on crocodiles?" asked Hamilton; "was it something exceptional?" "A tremendous chap, sir," said the enthusiastic Bones, "some fifty feet long, and as green as----" "As green!" repeated Hamilton quickly, "where are we?" He looked with a swift glance along the shore for landmarks. "I hope to goodness you have not shot old M'zooba," he said. "I don't know your friend by name," said Bones, "but why shouldn't I shoot him?" "Because, you silly ass," said Hamilton, "she is a sort of sacred crocodile." "She was never so sacred as she is now, sir, for: