Waterbury evening Democrat., 1890-01-11

FORM.
 koodoo or an eland. To my delight there the little creature lay-the huge bullet had decapitated it. Considering all the circumstances do not think I havo often made better shot than this, but If any one doubts, let him try his hand at rabbits head fifty yards away with an elephant gun and three-ounce ball.
 I picked up the Petie in triumph and returned to the camp. There we skinned him and toasted him over the fire. He just made good meal for us, keeping his hind legs for breakfast.
 There was no moon that night, and so 1t chanced that when I suddenly remem- bered the lion spoor, and suggested that we had better tic up the horses quite close to us, wo could not find them, though wo knew that they were grazing within fifty yards. This being so, we could only make up the fire and take our chance. Shortly afterward 1 went to sleep with little T ta in my arms. Sud- denly was awak ned by hearing that peculiar painful sound, the scream of a horse, quite close to the fire, which was still burning brightly. Next second there came noise of galloping hoofs, and before I could even rise my poor horse appeared in the ring of freight. As in flash of lightning saw his star ing eyes and wide-stretched nostrils, and the broken rein with which he had been knee-haltseed flying in the air. Also saw something else, for on his back was great dark form with glowing eyes, and from the form came growing sound. It was lion.
 The horse dashed on. He galloped | right through the fire, for which he had run in his terror-fortunatel however, without treading on us-and vanished into the night. We heard his hoofs for Q hundred yards or more; then there was silence, broken now and again by dis tant growls. As may be inagained, we did not sleep any more that night, but waited anxiously till, two hours later, | the dawn broke.
 | As soon as there was sufficient light we rose, and, leaving Tota still asleep, crept cautiously in tho direction in which the horse had Va =hed. When we had gone fifty yards or so we mado out the remains lying on the veldt, and | caught sight of two great cat-like forms sinking away in the gray light
 To go any further was useless; we | knew all about it now, and we turned to | look for the other horse. But our cup of | misfortune was not yet full. It was no- where to be found. Soon we came upon it's spoor, and then we saw what had hap l pened. Terrified by the sight and smell of the lions, it had with desperate ef- fort also burst the rein with which it had been hnee-haltered and galloped far | away. For now wo were left alone In these vast solitudes without a horse to carry us, and with child who was not old enough to walk more than little | way at time.
 | Well, it was no use giving in, so, with few words, wo went back to our camp, where found Tota crying because she had woke to find herself alone, and ate little food. Then we prepared to start. First, we divided such articles as we | must take with us into two equal parts, rejecting every thing that we could pos sibly do without. Then, by an after thought, wo filled our water-bottles though at the time I was rather against doing so because of the extra weight. But Indaba-zimbi overruled mo in the matter, fortunately for all three of us' I settled to look after Tota for the first march, and gavo the elephant gun to 1ndaba-zimbi. At length all was ready and we set out on foot. By tho help o1 occasional lifts over rough places, Tots managed to walk up the slope on the hillside where I had shot the Petie buck. At length we reached 1t, and looking at the country beyond, gave an exclamation of dismay. To say that it was desert would be saying toe much; it was more like the Barroo 1T ha c+11H6 aC here and there with low shrubs and scattered rocks. But it was great OK panse of desolate land, stretching as fa1 as the eye could reach, and bordered fal away by line of purple hills, in tho center of which a great solitary peal scared high into the air.