A MORNING’S ADVENTURE ON THE KALAKARI.

Evening Star, Issue 14053, 7 May 1909, Page 12

A MORNING’S ADVENTURE ON THE KALAKARI.

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[By H. A. Brydex, .author of ‘Kloof and Karroo,' etc.] It is a typical South African picture. Dotted about the plain there must be at the very least two or three separate troops of bartebcest, all attracted hither by the new grass just now springing rapidly under the influence of rain and sun. In all some sixty hartcheest are scattered about the flat, some alone, some in pairs or threes, others in larger groups. Most of them are feeding steadily with their heals to the gentle breeze, just now blowing in the direction of t.lie hunters. A few are lying down, chewing the cud. Here two young bulls, down upon their knees, arc butting at one another playfully, for all the world like a pair of frisky lambs. ■ The two white hunters continue to gaze earnestly for several minutes on the scene before them. How best can they circumvent these big reddish-brown antelopes and bag a head or two of game? A whispered conversation with the Bushmen, conducted by the colored after-rider as interpeter between the parties, results quickly in a plan of action being agreed upon. The Bushmen are to skirt the woodlands, uriScen to the bartebcest, work their wayround. and appearing at the far end of the flat, drive the game as ouietlv ns possible in the direction of the mounted men. who. in their turn, are (o remain oormeabd at various points. The Alasarwas depart on their errand, a pleased, eager smile on their bronze faces They scent fresh meat, of all tilings in this wide world the most dear to them. Traversing the screen of bush at a steady, silent trot—a pace these untiring children of the desert can sustain during a long day—they move away rapidly, and in less than an liour have fulfilled their mission and reached the further extremity of the plain.

Meanwhile the two white men, retiring into the forest, separate, and, each of them working round to the flanks of tlie oblong flat, post themselves presently in situations where with reasonable luck they may expect to get a fair shot or two at the game before them. Piet, .the colored boy, remains with his nag in the position first arrived at. He is to act as a kind of stop. Antelopes seldom take down wind when alarmed. They prefer to have their keen and delicate nostrils always pointing to the breeze, the quarter of danger. Their noses are. in fact, far greater safeguards to them than either their eyes or their ears, although these, in truth, are sharp and vigilant enough. Thus from Piet’s position, right to leeward of the hartebeest, he is not nearly so likely to get a shot as his two masters, now posted on either side of the big grass flat. —Suspense.—• ■ln fifty minutes, or a little more, the •anxious watchers begin to notice slight signs of movement, among the big red antelopes. The Bushmen have appeared at the other end of the plain, and are apparently quite casually walking straight down the centre. It is not long before the group of hartebeest nearest to them have got their wind and perceived them. But tlie antelopes arc, in these solitudes, seldom indeed disturbed by firearms; they have no great fear of the Bushmen at tiie comparatively safe distance at which they now are, and all they do for the present is to move w little further into the plain. Their action is commitnicated, ns it were automatically, to those of the antelopes nearest to them, and a gentle movement is to be noticed among them also. The animals are not alarmed enough to take up-wind and break into a gallop); all they do is to sidle away gently from the proximity of certain suspicious characters, of whom, however, at present they are not greatly afraid. But in this movement, which, •as the Masarwas approach, is to be noticed now all over the fiat, some of the antelopes are approaching that right hand flank of the I*l aiiij where, hiding behind a screen of bush, one of the two Englishmen is. with superhuman patience and a thrilling anxiety awaiting them. His good horse is fastened to a tree well in the shelter of the woodland a hundred yards away, and lie is watching, in that -deep, half-pleasurabie, half-painful suspense so well known to stalkers of big game, the approach of a group of four hartebeest 'towards the sp>ot where he lies in wait. The movement is succeeding beautifully. Hie four hartebecst are now three hundred yards distant; sometimes they stand with heads up snuffing the breeze and gazing in the direction of the Bushmen; anon their long faces go down, and they feed again. Steadily they approach. Now at last they are within one hundred and iiftv yards. W 7 ill they come nearer ? No! Yes! They still come on! But they are becoming manifestly more anxious, and the movement, on the flat is becoming more universal. The beasts are getting uneasy. Now they are within one hundred and ten yards—*' hundred—ninety.

A good bull hartebeest, with a fine thick rugged pair of horns, stands nearest to the expectant gunner, lying there stretched prone in the grass. The animal’s eye, the dark face marking, are plainly apparent. The trigger is pressed, and suddenly a sharp report breaks upon the wonderful stillness of the grass plain. Down goes the great hartebeest, stricken in exactly the right-.place, through heart and Inn,". He staggers to his feet again, but just as he is attempting to set off after his fellows. now .scouring away across the flat, heating up obliquely in the direction of the wind, another missile from the same weapon .shatters his shoulder, and he voes to the red earth again. The impact of two crashing, rending .450 bullets is too much even for the extraordinary vitality of • a hartebeest. proverbially the very toughest of all African game animals, and the antelope, with a brief finny of kicks, stretches itself, shudders, and delivers ml its life. —Pursuit.— Leaving Die Bushmen and his after-rider to look after the dead game, the hunter runs back for his horse, flings himself into the saddle, and in three minutes is spurring after the hartebeest, which from all parts of the plain are now gathering n their various bands and making off upwind. it is interesting to note how quickly the various units collect themselves in the troops in which they are accustomed to range. One band takes off ria-ht-hauded, bearing round into the wind, with the hi ease on their left front. A nother troop, apparently more panic-stricken and more desperate, heads nearly directly up into the wind’s eye, and, chancing the Bushmen, pass within less than two hundred paces of the nearest Masarwas. A third troop, quickly getting itself into the wedge or phalanx-shaped formation in which thole antelopes love to run. is making lefthanded across the flat, bearing 3 away obliquely so as to pass on the further side of the advancing Bushmen. This troop is most carefully watched by the second Englishmen, secreted on the other side of the plain. It is apparent to him that the hartebeest will scarcely come within hail of him in his present'situation, and he therefore runs into the bush behind him for his nag, mounts, and rides out to cut them off. Once on the open grass he pushes at his hardest pace, and his'gallant chestnut, knowing exactly what is required n him, and seeing with his own sharp eyes a troop of running game swinging across the veldt away there to the right front, cocks his ears, gives a whisk or two of his long tail, and lays himself out to his task. Horsemen and hartebeest. near one another rapidly.

. The antelopes, which a minute or so since were swinging along in what looked like a somewhat heavy and uncouth canter, but which was in reality a very smart pace, are now stretching themselves out i 1° their work, and are moving with that i free, smooth, machine-like action—an action which the South African hunter, who is familiar with these animals, knows to be perfectly untiring— at a speed which will soon carry them far beyond the reach of all pursuers. The hunter reaches the po nt he made for, and the hartebeest, sticking to their line, sweep’ past- him at m distance of a trifle over a hundred and

twenty yards. Even at this short distance it is by no means an easy shot, at the pace the antelopes flash by, big as are the moving targets. The hunter has jumped off his horse, raised his rifle, and, drawing a long breath, pulls trigger. the loud clap of the bullet tells him instantly that he has hit something. In Die fi>«un6 instant one of the hartebeest—running about the middle of the troop—turns a complete somersault, and as its comrades pelt on, iies -struggling on the veldt, huutically endeavoring to rke again. The hunter runs up, and, somewhat puzzled, puts an end to tie stricken beast’s pain. Then he sees what has happened. He has made a bad 'but an extraordinary lucky shot, his bullet having broken both of the hartebeest’s forelegs, just below tlie knees. With one leg broken, • the antelope would easily have made good her retreat—she is a fat cow with nice horns—with both broken, she was helpless. - Gu tluree legs these antelopes will go for ever; on two they are, of course, crippled completely. —An Escape.-

The hunter now knee-halters hie horse, takes off its saddle and bridle, and allows it to graze; while he himself, having adniired his prize thus fortunately seemed, lights a welcome pipe, takes out'liis Green River’ hunting knife, and proceeds methodically to skm his quatrry. He has done as much as he cares about in the way of sport.

Not so his companion, who is now flying after the troop running nearest him, that on the extreme right of the plain. A mile oar so further and the chase sweeps into another and smaller plain. Suddenly about the middle, of this flat, just as the sportsman anticipated, the troop swings round, as if at the word of command, and, with heads up, red eyes staring—the hartebeest’s eyes are curiously red of hue—and nostrils distended, stand and gaze. It is fatal curiotity. In another half-minute their pursuer, swinging steadily along, lias got within three hundreds yards of them. Suddenly he, too, reins up, slips from his saddle, and, taking aim at one of a “klompje” of the antelopes in the very heart of the troop, fires. Dire is the confusion of tlie bay-brown antelopes at the shot. One of them staggers at the loud smack of the bullet, and the whole of the troop—a score or more in number—now fly at top speed from this so dangerous proximity. . The wounded buck lags a little, but not much. He is not well hit, struck as he is too far back in the barrel, and—so tenacious of life are these antelopes—he may travel half a day yet. The horseman remounts and gallops in pumuit, hoping against hope that the beast will tail and be ultimately secured. The hartebeest, it- is true, turns out of the troop, as nearly all wounded animals do, but he runs apparently as strongly as ever; and, after another hour’s galloping, the hunter gives up the pursuit, and, hot and a little angry, returns slowly to his first buck.

On’ reaching the flat where the game was first encountered, the sportsman finds the skinning and eutting-up operations nearly complete. The skins, horns, and the best part of the meat are fastened securely on three ponies; the bushmen stagger under loads of those delicate morceaux, chiefly from the entrails of the slain beasts, which only such children of the desert can pool, a few miles distant, at which their appreciate; and presently the party set off in high contentment for the clear desert waggons are oubspanned.