red; "mark over back. We cooky for supper."

"I wish Stanley had caught him alive," said Leo. "Now, Timbo, cannot
you manage to get a young one for us, or a couple, and then we could
break them in, and make them carry us."

"Him no carry no one," answered Timbo. "He wild. Kick off, even dough
you stick on like Chico."

"But we could soon teach Chico to ride it. I suspect that it would
puzzle even a zebra to kick him off."

"We will try," said Timbo. "We go and make many pitfalls; but take
care, Massa Natty, you no tumble in when tiger or leopard dere."

I found that the men had already dug some pitfalls, though hitherto,
excepting a koodoo, nothing had been caught in them.

Next morning they set off to visit the pits, accompanied by the boys.
In rather more than an hour they came back, Leo and Natty dragging a
beautiful little animal between them, while the two men brought the head
and skin and a quantity of meat of another. David, who was with me, ran
out to meet them.

"They have got a gemsbok!" he exclaimed; "one of the most interesting of
the antelope tribe. It is known also as the oryx."

"How did you catch it?" he asked.

"We found it in the pit!" exclaimed the boys at once; "the mother and
the young one. Poor little creature. The mother fought so furiously
that the men were obliged to kill her, and not till then could we get
the young one out. But it will make a capital playmate for the koodoo."

"It is very hungry," said David. "We will try if it will take some
milk."

While Leo and Natty ran off to milk a goat, the men held the little
animal, which, though it trembled, made no attempt to escape. David
examined the head of the larger one. It had beautiful horns, nearly
three feet in length, slightly curving backwards, and of a shiny black
colour, and very slender. The mane and tail were very like those of a
horse, while the shape of the head and the colour were those of an ass,
the legs and feet, however, showing it to be an antelope. Both the
horns were so exactly equal that I could fancy a person taking a side
view of the animal might imagine them to be one and the same; and David
said that the gemsbok has often therefore been supposed, by those who
have seen it at a distance only, to be the unicorn which the ancients
believed to exist. The little calf was of a reddish cream colour, and
was so small that the horns had scarcely yet appeared. Timbo told us
that the gemsboks were ge