How I found Livingstone : $b Travels, adventures, and discoveres in Central Africa, including an account of four months' residence with Dr. LivingstoneStanley, Henry M. (Henry Morton)
History
How I found Livingstone : $b Travels, adventures, and discoveres in Central Africa, including an account of four months' residence with Dr. Livingstone
Stanley, Henry M. (Henry Morton)
Africa, Central -- Description and travel; Livingstone, David, 1813-1873
Here at last was the hunter's Paradise! How petty and insignificant
appeared my hunts after small antelope and wild boar what a foolish
waste of energies those long walks through damp grasses and through
thorny jungles! Did I not well remember ' my first bitter experience
in African jungles when in the maritime region! But this--where is
the nobleman's park that can match this scene? Here is a soft, velvety
expanse of young grass, grateful shade under those spreading clumps;
herds of large and varied game browsing within easy rifle range. Surely
I must feel amply compensated now for the long southern detour I have
made, when such a prospect as this opens to the view! No thorny jungles
and rank smelling swamps are here to daunt the hunter, and to sicken
his aspirations after true sport! No hunter could aspire after a nobler
field to display his prowess.
Having settled the position of the camp, which overlooked one of
the pools found in the depression of the Gombe creek, I took my
double-barrelled smooth-bore, and sauntered off to the park-land.
Emerging from behind a clump, three fine plump spring-bok were seen
browsing on the young grass just within one hundred yards. I knelt down
and fired; one unfortunate antelope bounded upward instinctively, and
fell dead. Its companions sprang high into the air, taking leaps about
twelve feet in length, as if they were quadrupeds practising gymnastics,
and away they vanished, rising up like India-rubber balls; until a
knoll hid them from view. My success was hailed with loud shouts by the
soldiers; who came running out from the camp as soon as they heard the
reverberation of the gun, and my gun-bearer had his knife at the beast's
throat, uttering a fervent "Bismillah!" as he almost severed the head
from the body.
Hunters were now directed to proceed east and north to procure meat,
because in each caravan it generally happens that there are fundi, whose
special trade it is to hunt for meat for the camp. Some of these are
experts in stalking, but often find themselves in dangerous positions,
owing to the near approach necessary, before they can fire their most
inaccurate weapons with any certainty.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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