wall, some twelve feet high, hindered us the other way from getting a view of the bottom of the hills, so that we really had not the chance of ascertaining the cause of the commotion. By way of a joke, I said that perhaps the baboons had taken advantage of our dinner-hour to go and pay the farmer a visit. Scarcely had I said the words when a big baboon came springing up, not much more than 200 yards away, to the left; then another, then another and another, until there was a whole herd of them, going leisurely enough, and squatting down ever and again upon the stones. The farmer, with a bevy of servants, was in full chase; they were armed with sticks and stones, and kept shouting vehemently. Here we thought was a good chance for us; we would mount the hill across the line of the retreat, without diverting the attention of the baboons from the noisy crowd that was following them; and thus I hoped we might be able to get within gunshot unobserved.
As one of our party had only small shot, and the other nothing but a stick, I insisted upon their remaining close at my side, knowing that a full-grown baboon, when infuriated, is as dangerous a foe as a leopard.
We were more than half-way up the hill before there was a chance at all; and when a baboon did appear at last above us, it managed so adroitly to be always either beneath a bush or behind a stone, that to take a fair aim was simply impossible.
When the brute had gained the top of the hill, of
