Page:Seven Years in South Africa v2.djvu/99

 settled down in the middle of the triple-forked recess that I had chosen for my ambush.

The sun, meanwhile, had all but set; only a few golden streaks on the highest boughs remained, and these gradually faded away. My insight that night into scenes of animal life proved even far more diversified than I could venture to anticipate.

Amongst the first of the sounds to arrest my attention was the sonorous “quag-ga, quag-ga” of the male zebras; they were on the grass-plains, keeping watch over their herds; with this was soon mingled the melancholy howl of the harnessed jackal, awakening the frightful yell of its brother, the grey jackal; the beasts, I could not doubt, were all prowling round the enclosure of our camp. For some hours the various noises seemed to be jumbled together, but towards midnight they became more and more distinct, so that I could identify them separately, and fancied that I could count the beasts that made them. After a while a peculiar scraping commenced, caused by rhyzænas hunting in the sand for worms and larvæ; it went on all night except during the brief intervals when the busy little creatures were temporarily disturbed by some movement near them.

The gazelles and antelopes came down quite early to lick at the salt mud in the Nata-bed; they evidently were accustomed to get back to their haunts in the open lands before the beasts of prey quitted their lairs in the wood. Some of the little steinbocks (those most graceful of South African gazelles) came down so cautiously along the track that it was only through accidentally looking down that I was aware of their being near me. I think