Our course lay south-west. The fog had receded but not disappeared; it hung more or less thickly over the plains before us. But it lifted and fell in a most peculiar way; slow undulations, and graceful, deliberate eddies played along its indefinite fringe. Soon we noticed game spoor. Yes,--the Capitalist was right. But how large the spoor was; it suggested blesbuck rather than springbuck. What was that looming through the fog-fringe? It looked almost as large as a cow. But the brown stripe and the lyre-formed horns shewed up clearly every now and then; the creature was indubitably a springbuck. It was not more than two hundred yards away. I supposed it was the changing drift of vapour that distorted and magnified the animal. However, I fired and it fell. When we approached the struggling creature I gazed upon it with astonishment; it was so immense. Why, it must have been nearly twice as large as the springbuck of the desert. I asked the Capitalist if this were not an extraordinary specimen. No, he said, all the bucks in the vicinity were about as large. Then I recalled having read in Francis Galton's book that he shot a springbuck weighing a hundred and sixty pounds near Walfish Bay. These Richtersveld bucks,--so the Capitalist informed me, do not trek. They must belong to a distinct sub-species,-- the range of which is restricted to the Coast Desert. As we wandered on towards Arris, the fog-curtain kept ascending and again settling down. But it did not lift to any great extent; one could never see farther than from three to four hundred yards ahead. I shot three more bucks; all were of the same type. One young animal, with horns not more than a hands-breadth long, which I shot by mistake when the fog was more than usually thick, was larger than the ordinary buck of the inland desert. I presented one of the four bucks to the Capitalist; he hid it among some bushes, intending to pick it up as he returned from Arris with the pony. The other three carcases we took on with us. I meant to cut one up and divide it among the guides. It would not have done to have left the carcase to be dismembered on the return journey; these people were so jealous of each other that a fight would surely have resulted. We reached Arris late in the afternoon. I learnt that some people had been there with ghoonyas, but Fauna so terrified them with a description of my wrath on the occasion of the last gatherers turning up, that they fled. To prevent misunderstanding it had better be explained that Arris is not a city--not even a hamlet. It is merely a place where, in specially favourable seasons, a few of the Richtersvelders sojourn with their goats. The locality is usually known by another name; one that is more realistic than refined.