IN THE JUNGLE

Hokitika Guardian, 1 December 1928, Page 7

IN THE JUNGLE

A WOMAN’S ADVENTURES. (By KATHLEEN GLOVER.) FORT ARCH IM A B AULT, Eroncli Equate] ial Africa, August 12.

Dawn. Through the morning haze wo could see Senegal liartobeest, red fronted gazelle, and pretty little duiker feeding their way to water. Occasionally a jackal, disturbed at the remains of his nocturnal feast, ran ahead ol our small caravan, tail between legs, and disappeared into the thick bus)'. Girafie silhouetted against the sky lorm tin* most beautiful picture the hunter can find in Africa.

But we passed without a backward glance. They were not the object ol our search. We were following on the heels oif a heard of elephants we had heard cry as they passed our camp the previous night. We needed a complete skeleton for the Natural History section of the British .Museum. After four hours’ hard trek we came on them, a small herd of fifteen. 1 hey were standing lending in a sun-shot glade. My husband I and one guncarrier crept forward until only twenty yards separated us from the nearest of the herd—a fine old cow who contentedly stood flicking flies off her tough hide.

Near by a mother was covering her small offspring with red earth. He was as provoking as all small children are at bath time, but a resounding smack on the side rtf the head brought him to his sense squealing. Jt was marvellous to watch the small youngsters—amazing miniature reproductions of their giant parents —as they gambolled and played in the solt sand. For twenty minutes we lay screened by a small hush trying to find the position of the largest hull. At last We decided on him. He seemed head and shoulders above liis herd, his enormous ears flapping to and fro like thd sails of a felucca, a magnificent picture ol gigantic strength. M v husband crept slightly forward and'slightly to the left to obtain the brain shot. A second’s pause and tin bull crashes, bringing with him a tree. His tusk‘ lay buried two feet in the bal'd earth. The monarch had fallen.

For two days the dissection went on. The stench of sun-rotting meat was awful. The natives worked sullenK. Time and time again the hundreds that had collected had to be fought off the decaying mass. They were meat mad and the sight of so much drove them to any extreme. To have given it would have meant the cessation of work, and even possibly led to bloodshed. Hourly our task became more diflicult. The eutters-up wore gorged u bursting point with pieces ol the fles’ torn from the carcase which they thrust into their mouths and sliced with a knife.

A tasty morsel led to a fight, and in a second the camp was in an uproar. Natives descended from all sides in ; mad scramble for meat. Women threw their nude bodies on the huge pile o' offal, screaming and fighting like demented things to obtain some. My husband and his boys dashed this way and that, belaying and smashing in their endeavour to separate the mad throng from the meat. Down thej would slip as they sought to obtain some bone from a blood-crazy native.

But at last, after many hard blows had been exchanged, order was restored. Then stfirted the task of collecting the bones that had been draggen in every direction by the thieving crowd. It was a relief to find them all sale. Our work had not been in vain.

The obliging District Officer who had supplied us with porters, being unable to convey to the natives why we needed bones, hit on the original idea of telling them that the King of England wanted them, and therefore it behoved everyone to give us all the assistance they could in our difficult task.

Valiantly tlio natives carried out their share of the contract until it came to the arduous labour oil transporting the bones to our base camp forty miles away. The hones were naturally very heavy and made unwieldlv loads, which necessitated our forming a rear guard to retrieve any hones cast into the hush by the porters. Sixteen men staggered along under the huge head—moat drunk. As light was falling we reached our camp, exhausted but happy, our task complete, for we were now on a motor road. As my eyes closed in sleep T recalled the words of our head porter: “ Tell the King of England the bones he had chop, the meat he best past all.”