One is frequently curiously attended in Africa by strange followers, and I found myself one night with a footman behind me that might have struck terror into a lady's heart were John Thomas to be thus suddenly transformed. Happening to be at the house famous for the leopard's visit, and going out at about ten o'clock to saddle my horse that I had tied to a tree in the garden, I found him absent; and upon inquiring at the Kaffirs' kraal near, they told me that he had broken his halter and levanted for some time. This was the second trick of the kind that he had played me; on the former occasion, a friend, whose horse had behaved better, accompanied me, and we shared the saddle, turn and turn about, for the four miles that constituted the journey home. On this evening I had to trudge it alone, and what was worse, without my gun; for, having merely gone out to take tea, I had left my usual gun at home. I borrowed an assagy from the Kaffirs and trotted off. The road for great part of the way was lined with bush. A river about three feet deep had to be crossed, and then the flat sands of the Congella, famous for the battle between the Boers and the English troops. I went on with caution, listening occasionally, as the elephants were near the edge of the bush I had passed in the afternoon, their feeding being clearly heard from the smashing of the large branches. It was not advisable to rub shoulders with these gentlemen unarmed, and in the night, if it could be avoided. I had passed the little river Umbilo about two hundred yards, when, upon suddenly stopping to listen, I heard something behind me; so dropping to the ground, I placed my head low, and made out the shambling figure of a cowardly hyaena in relief against the sky. I flung a stone at him and he shuffled away. Soon after I heard him behind me again, and he followed at a respectable distance until I reached the village of D'Urban. These brutes, although possessing a strength of jaw capable of grinding an ox's leg-bone to powder, are still such curs as to fly before a dog; and on one occasion, near Pietermaritzburg, four of them were chased for a couple of miles by my old dog, and made such good use of their legs that I could not get near enough for a shot.