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Nature, Gardens & Animals
Sporting Scenes amongst the Kaffirs of South Africa
Alfred Wilks Drayson
338 pages~6 hr 44 min read39 chapters$4.99
A long sea voyage, porpoises and a hooked albatross, then an ox-wagon rolling inland from Algoa Bay into the South African veld. Alfred Drayson recounts sporting scenes and travels among the peoples and wildlife of the Cape frontier. Lively and observant, it carries the reader deep into nineteenth-century Africa. Climb aboard the wagon and go.
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Inside this book
39 chapters
- 1Captain Alfred W. Drayson "Sporting Scenes amongst the Kaffirs of South Africa"
- 2Preface.
- 3Chapter One.
- 4Voyage to the Cape—Discomforts of a long voyage—The wolf turned lamb—Porpoises and Portuguese men-of-war—The mate’s story—Catching a shark—An albatross hooked—Cape Town—Algoa Bay—Ox-waggon—South-African travelling—Obstinacy conquered—Expeditious journeying—Frontier of the colony.
- 5Chapter Two.
- 6Dutch and Kaffir words—Frontier Kaffirs—Kaffir women—Kaffir soldiers Cattle-stealing—Bush-fighting—Colonel Napier’s opinion—Equipment of English soldiers—A British soldier in the bush—Kaffir manoeuvres—Corn-pits—Treatment of Kaffir thieves—The assagy and other weapons—Moral qualities of the Kaffirs—Native marksmen—Power of the chiefs—Religious opinions—Hottentot soldiers.
- 7Chapter Three.
- 8Narrow escape—Sandilli goes home—Voyage to Natal—My fellow, passengers—Tempting viands—Property overboard—Natal Bay—The “tick”—Beauty of the vegetation—Dolce far niente—Cape horses—points of a Cape horse—Shooting-ponies—Mode of journeying—The “sickness”—Training a shooting-horse—Endurance of Cape horses—A rough journey—A stormy night—Agreeable termination.
- 9Chapter Four.
- 10Warnings against the bush—Search after a leopard—Unsteady hands—methods of hunting elephants—Speed of the elephant—Bush-travelling—Traces of the elephants—Solitude of the bush—Tracking the herd—Charge of angry elephants—The horses reached—Search for the wounded elephant—The successful shot—An unwitting escape.
- 11Chapter Five.
- 12Necessity of a gun—Strange footstep—A disappointment—Vicinity of the Umganie—Duiker buck—Matuan the Kaffir—Vocal telegraph—Reitbok—A human pointer—Singular conversation—Apathy of the residents—Kaffir messengers—Buck shooting—The buck’s tenacity of life—A buck on three legs—Dangerous country—A sporting red-coat—Strange sportsmen.
- 13Chapter Six.
- 14Eland-hunting—Beautiful country—Telescopic eyes—Loading at a gallop—The Dutch Boers—Speed of the eland—Eland-hunt—Unsuccessful result—Signals of distress—African Nimrods—A herd of elands—Better luck this time—An accident—The Slough of Despond—A “Sticks bullet”—In at the death—A bivouac—Air-pillows.
- 15Chapter Seven.
- 16The Dutchman’s stratagem—Wild-boar hunt—A vicious pigling—Hartebeest-chase—Hide and seek—The organ of “locality”—Fatal curiosity—An escapade—A false alarm—Baboons at home—A tame baboon—The baboon and the crow—Literary and scientific tastes—A leopard shot—Unpleasant journey—Conflicting opinions.
- 17Chapter Eight.
- 18The Bivouac—Hotman’s story—Terrible misfortune—Both sides of the story—How to find water—Kemp’s story—Death of Mabili—Single Elephants to be avoided—Hendrick and the Leopard—A struggle for life—A weary night—A poisonous companion—The rescue—Savage hermits—The “Trek-boken.”
+ 21 more. The full contents open with the book.
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