ABOUT BIG CAME.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 539, 5 February 1913, Page 2

ABOUT BIG CAME.

Mr. E. B. Bronson, a hunter of many years' experience, supplies the "Century" with some of the characteristics of big game. By many sportsmen the African huffalo is considered • a far more dangerous antagonist than the lion. Loving the shade and concealment of papyrus swamps, dense forests, and fifteen-feet-high elephant-grass, buffaloes are seldom seen until one is within a few yards, and often a few feet, of them. Herds of buffalo seldon charge a man deliberately ; but when startled by the scent of the sportsman or by a shot, they stampede, and often come thundering straight upon the hunter, who is lucky indeed if rapid and close shooting turns them. The real danger with buffalo is with a wounded beast or in an encounter with a lone bull. A DANGEROUS CUSTOMER.

While easily stalked, the rhinoceros is, Mr. Bronson goes on to point out, a dangerous customer. If he gets one's scent, he almost invariably charges, often, probably, from sheer curiosity ; but that does not make him any the easier to dispose of. Moreover, he runs and turns at a speed inconceivable in a beast of his vast bulk. Against his massive, sloping head the heaviest bullet is a mere flea-bite, leaving no possibility of a stopping shot except with a hard-nosed ball sent fairly into the heart through the chest. An alternative is to stand absolutely motionless, when, with his bad eyesight, there is a possibility he may mistake you for a. tree, and veer past. Indeed, the beat ruse in the crisis of any charge is to stand fast and still. ELEPHANTS AND LIONS.

The most exhausting and nerveracking work of the African sportsman is, in Mr. Bronson's opinion, the pursuit of the elpfcant. As regards the lion, he seeks, as a rule, no trouble with man, a-ad usually he will do all that comports with his kingly dignity to avoid it. At a man's approach often he will retire from feasting on a fresh kill. Seldom do lions become man-eaters, deliberate predatory raiders of villages or camps for human food, until so old that they find difficulty in taking even zebra their easiest prey, and through stress of hunger or by some happy chance have learned that man is easier and, perhaps, tenderer. But once he gets that knowledge and the taste, woe to those whom be happens to come across. HOW LONG WILL THE BIG GAME LAST ? Answering the question how long the big game in East Africa can last, Mr. Bronson replies— Certainly not more than four or five years in anything like its present abundance and easy reach. About 1,200,000 acres have already been taken up by white settlers, stockraisers, and farmers, who find it difficult, and in some places impossible, to maintain fecees. As a result, settlers have been actively urging changes in the game laws to permit the shooting at will of trespassing game, and recently the Governor, Sir James Hayes Sadler, said at a public dinner that public game preservation must not be permitted to impede the development of the country by white settlers. But Mr. Bronson does not believe that anyone now living will see African big game exterminated.