The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1910-01-20
"A BUFFALO HUNT.
Col. Roosevelt Indulges i'm One
in African Swamps.
He Was in a Critical Position
for Moment or Two.
WHYDAH BIRDS DANCE
They Cut Up Peculiar Capers
for Feathered Things.
Have Special Rings to Put on
Their Stunts in.

New York. Jan 2o--ColoneI Roose-
veIt's fifth installment Of his African
Game Trails" which appears in Scrfb-
ner's magazine for February, pictures
"A Buffalo Hunt by the Kamiti" At
least such is the hunting feature of this
instaIIment- There is much else in it of
interest though, including vivid descrip-
! tfons of the country, the papyrus
swamps in which the buffalo live; the
small birds and beasts which abound.
with their strange habits, such as the
dancing rings used by one class of
birds.
|. A Critical Moment.
As Mr.. Roosevelt has written before
the buffalo is one Of the most danger
Gus OF the animals that help to make
Africa famous And he tells of rath-
er exciting experience he had with a
herd of them as follows
We crept UP the water course until
about opposite the buffalo, which were
now lying down Cuninghame peered
cautiously at them, saw there were
two or three, and then led US on all
fours toward them There were patches
where the grass was short, and other
places where il was three feet high. and
after a god deal of cautious crawling
we had covered half the distance to-
ward them, when one of them made Us
out, and several rose from their beds.
They were still at least two hundred
yards of-a long range for heavy rifles;
but any closer approach was impossible,
and we fired Both the leading bulls
were hit and at the shots there rose
from the grass not half a dozen buffalo.
but seventy eighty. and started at
gallop parallel to the swamp and across
our front In the rear were number IT
cows and calves, and I at once singled
out a COW and fired She plunged for
ward at the shot and turned toward the
swamp. going slowly and dead lame, for
my bullet had struck the shoulder and
had gone into the cavity of the chest
But at this moment our attention was
distracted from the wounded COW by
the conduct of the herd, which, headed
by the wounded bulls turned in a quar-
ter-circle toward US, and drew up IN a
phalanx facing US with outstretched
heads It was not a nice country IN
which to be charged by the herd, and
for moment things trenFbled in the
balance. There was perCeptible mo-
tion Of uneaSiness among some of our
followers Stand steady. Don't rum
1 called out And don't shootv called
out Cuuinghame; for to do either would
invite charge A few seconds passed,
and then the unwounded mass Of the
herd resumed their flight, and after a
little hesitation the wounded bulls fol-
lowed"
Dance OF the Whytiah Birds.
OF the birds that have a special ring
writes:
but the most interesting birds we
saw were the black whydah fnches-
The female is a duII-colored, ordinary
looking bird, somewhat like female
bobolink The male in his courtship
dress is clad in a uniform dark glossy
suit, and his tail-feathers are almost
like some of those of barnyard
rooster being twice as long as the rest
of the bird, with a downward curve
at the tips The females were gen
orally found in flocks, in which there
WoIld often be a goodly number of
males also and when the flocks put
on speed the males tended to drop be-
hind The f1ocks were feeding in Heat
Iey'S grain fields, and he was threat
eniug vengeance upon them 1 was
sorry for the male birds certainly
have habits of peculiar interest They
were not shy, although if we ap-
preached too near them in their favor
ite haunts, the grassland adjoining the
papyrus beds, they would fly off and
perch on the tops of the papyrus
stems The long tail hampers the bird
in its fight. and 1t is often held at
rather an angle downward, giving the
bird a peculiar and almost insect like
appearance But the marked and ex-
traordfnary popularity was the Gus
tom the cocks had of dancing in arti-
ficiaIly made dancing rings For
mile and a half beyond our camp,
down the course of the Kamiti. the
was thickIy strewn with these dane
ing rings Each was about two feet
in diameter, sometimes more. some
times less A tuft of growing grass
perhaps foot high was left in the
center. Over the rest of the ring the
grass was cut off close by the roots,
and the blades strewn evenly over the
surface of the ring. The cock bird
would then alight in the ring and hop
up to hight of a couple of feet.
wings spread and n1otiouIess. tail
dropping, and the head usually thrown
back