The first morning after losing a splendid eland, in company with Mahony, I met a fretful porcupine taking his morning constitutional. We waited till he walked within five yards and then gave chase. For a time the pace was hot, till I headed him off, and grabbed him, by the long hair on his neck, which promptly gave way (I mean the hair). I was again closing on him, when he suddenly backed, driving one quill through my boot, 1-½ in. through my little toe, and a dozen others into my leg, one through the tendon. One of my boys was badly mangled in a similar manner, and it was only after giving the fretful one a playful tap on the skull that we made him fast. I regret to say that two days afterwards he died. As the officials of a so-called Gorongoza Development Co., with its headquarters on the Dingi-Dingi, had seized our boys on their way to Fontesvilla with trophies, and ill-used them, we marched to the Pungwe, where I branched off to arrange matters, the others following the river towards Sarmento. I found seven or eight yellow-visaged creatures, a Portuguese-French mixture, who in three years had disposed of a capital of, I believe, some hundreds of thousands of francs, with the stupendous result of an asset comprising about fifty acres of castor oil (one of the most ineradicable weeds of the country). The Governor, who was very polite, told me that he was entitled to levy shooting licences, and after some talk we closed the matter with a payment of £10, which I should advise the shareholders of the Gorongoza Development Co. to keep an eye on, as it is the only return they are ever likely to see. He also told me that he should like a lion hunt, and had even sat up by his fowl-house for that purpose. Not long after we met him, vinously inclined, in Beira--the cheque had been cashed. On the Pungwe we watched some native blacksmiths at work. Several of their tools were very ingenious. Again we marched north, and striking the Pungwe by Tiga’s Kraal, crossed the island and the Dingi-Dingi, and eventually camped at the junction of a broad sandy river with the Urema. Sharp bagged a good buffalo with a 42-inch head the first night; and the following morning we found that a male lion had visited the carcase, but retired before our arrival. We tossed up as to who should sit up that night, and I was unlucky enough to win; unlucky, in that I spent one of the most awful nights it has ever been my lot to endure. Having built a small platform, 6 ft. from the ground, I repaired thither with a thick blanket at sunset. Soon about thirty hyænas appeared, and continued fighting, snarling, and uttering diabolical yells all night; while battalions of mosquitoes refreshed themselves at my expense, biting my knees, even through a camel’s-hair blanket and flannel trousers.