One very common form of the short knob-kerrie is shown at fig. 14. This weapon is only twenty inches in length, and can be conveniently carried in the belt. At close quarters it can be used as a club, but it is more frequently employed as a missile. The Kaffir is so trained from infancy to hurl his weapons that he always prefers those which can be thrown. The force and precision with which the natives will fling these short kerries is really astonishing. If Europeans were to go after birds, and provide themselves with knobbed sticks instead of guns, they would bring home but very little game. Yet a Kaffir takes his knob-kerries as a matter of course, when he goes after the bustard, the quail, or other birds, and seldom returns without success. The general plan is for two men to hunt in concert. They walk some fifty yards apart, and when they come to any spot which seems a likely place for game, they rest their kerries on their right shoulders, so as to lose no time in drawing back the hand when they wish to fling the weapon. As soon as a bird rises, they simultaneously hurl their kerries at it, one always aiming a little above the bird, and the other a little below. If, then, the bird catches sight of the upper club, and dives down to avoid it, the lower club takes effect, while, if it rises from the lower kerrie, it falls a victim to the upper. This plan is wonderfully efficacious, as I have proved by personal experience. One of my friends and myself determined to try whether we could kill game in the Kaffir fashion. So we cut some knobbed sticks, and started off in search of snipe. As soon as a snipe rose, we flung the stick at it, and naturally missed, as it was quite beyond the range of any missile propelled by hand. However, marking the spot where it alighted, we started it afresh, and by repeating this process, we got sufficiently near to bring it within the compass of our powers, and succeeded in knocking it down. Generally the short, thick, heavily knobbed kerrie belongs rather to the Hottentot and the Bosjesman than to the Zulu, who prefers the longer weapon, even as a missile. But it is evident that the former shape of the weapon is the original one, and that the Kaffir, who derived it from its original inventor, the Hottentot, has gradually lengthened the shaft and diminished the size of the head.