more closely when my attention was diverted by the sound of something moving among the bushes. I listened. Something--beast or human--was certainly approaching, and was not far off. Very silently I rose to my feet and stood close against the tree, stealthily peeping round the shaded side. As I did so I saw, on a patch of bare earth, a shadow, the appearance of which startled me considerably for the moment, for it exactly resembled the head of the horned image near the Aboási pool. It was not the Sakrobundi devil, however, as I immediately realised, but an antelope with curved horns--probably the demon’s prototype. I stepped back a pace and stood with my spear poised ready to throw. The shadow came nearer, vanished for a space, and then reappeared on the other side of the tree. A second later the animal’s head appeared, and instantly I flung the spear with all my strength. The startled beast leaped into the air and bounded away among the bushes with the spear hanging from its neck. I darted after it, and a few paces forward picked up the spear, while I could hear the wounded animal crashing through the undergrowth ahead. The pursuit was not difficult, for the track was marked by great pools of blood, and I had not gone much more than a quarter of a mile when I came upon my victim lying upon the ground dead. Very fortunately for me, the animal in its flight had gone straight towards the river and had fallen within fifty yards of the bank, so that, when I had ascertained my position, I was able to drag the carcase to the water and tow it down to the island, where I eventually got it ashore close to the staging. The skinning and cutting-up of the antelope was a formidable task, for the beast was nearly as large as a red stag, and I was considerably exercised in my mind as to how I should dispose of so much meat; for the flies had scented it already, and in the damp heat of the forest it would hardly keep twenty-four hours. At last it occurred to me to hang the joints up in the fire hut, which was always full of smoke and very dry, in the hope that they would become cured, and this plan I adopted, to the disappointment of the flies. In the afternoon I finished felling the Odúm tree, and selected two of its stoutest branches to form the inside keel or kelson of the canoe. These I cut off, so as to leave each one with about two feet of the main stem attached to it, forming an L-piece, which I intended to make into the stem-post and stern-post respectively.