The Holbrook news., 1912-03-29
w 5: :::: ;: :: ;: 5: ::; i: $ $ : = ;
 tinr and hunting n11rnnSnS
tiOn and huntlnl

WW through South and East Ali
 rica undertaken for explora-
 tion and hunting purposes,
 Sir Henry Seton-Kar, in Country Life,
 says:
 After a two months stay in the
 Mozambique district of Portuguese
 East Africa, where I had a two hun
 dred miles trek, with native carriers,
 through some little-known country, a
 Union Castle liner took me up the
 coast past Zanzibar to the fine harbor
 of Mombasa, or rather Kilindini
 (Mombasa being the town), which is
 the port of debarkation for the Ugan-
 da railway and the doorway to the
 highlands of British East Africa. My immediate object in visiting the new est colony was big-game-hunting. So 1 left Momhasa by the first available train, and in twenty-four hours had ascended six thousand feet, through palm grove, tropical jungle, thorn and grass-covered plain and mountain ranges to the high tableland whose altitude makes British East Africa possible as a white mans colony and another cradle for our race. Of this tableland Nairobi is the capital, and the social, commercial and political center. Never have I seen anything like the quantity of big-game in any part of the world such as now exist in their thousands in British East Af- rica. Even western America thirty years ago had nothing like this wealth of wild fauna. rather doubt If South Africa, in It's pioneer days, equalled 1t in this respect. For some hours before reaching Nairobi thou sands of zebra, hartebeeste (kon- goni), gazeIle of various kinds ("Grant's'' and ''Tommies') can be seen from the railway carriage win dows dotting the plains and grass-cov- cred, tree-sprinkled hillsides through which the railway runs. Herds of wildebeeste are almost always in sight; also other varieties of buck or antelope, such as impala and oribi; likewise an occasional rhino, and ire quently a herd of giraffe. I saw all these varieties from the train. A large portion of the country south of the railway to the German border is main tained as a game reserve, as well as the southern Nasal native reserve, and so abounds in game.
 One has heard so much of hunting parties visiting Nairobi of late years, and returning in every case laden with spells and trophies of the chase, that I had a sort of feeling, before hand. that the game would soon be all killed unless one hurried up and went soon. But now the mystery was solved. The country Is so fertile, pas toral and extensive, and the climate so equable, that it is capable of main taining an almost incredible amount of game, in addition to a great native population and a white settlers pop ulation. The game are there, and have not been recklessly slaughtered and squandered in the past. They are now only shot in a sportsmanlike under strict regulation as to numbers and locality-some rarer kinds being absolutely protected-and only on payment of a substantial H. cense fee; and the consequence is that. if anything, the game is increas- ing in numbers, not diminishing. In fact, the boot Is on the other leg. The question is whether, in some dis tricts, the commoner kinds of game are not too numerous. and should not, in the interest of settlers and their fencing and crops, be greatly reduced In numbers, or even altogether killed off. So far as my own hunting ex- periences are concerned, l enjoyed a most delightful and productive three | weeks safari, during the course of which I shot about forty head of big game either for meat or for trophies, including eighteen different varieties, | among them a great python sixteen | feet long. I am bound to confess, in | my view, that there is no great sport | Ing merit in obtaining the ordinary | common big-game trophies of East | Africa, such as wildebeeste, harte- | beeste, the various kinds of gazelle l and smaller antelope, zebra and wart- hog, all of which are to be found on ] the open plains and outside long grass and jungle. It is merely a question of how long one stays out and how many cartridges one uses. There are, however, other varieties of big-game | much harder to find and shoot, and in the hunting of which some woodcraft | and intelligence, as well as straight |