The stride of the buck was no match for the bound of the greyhound: the bitch was at his flanks, and he pressed along at flying speed.

He was close to the danger and it was still unseen: a moment more and "Hecate" sprang at his ear. Fortunately she lost her hold as the ear split. This check saved her. I shouted, "He'll be over!" and the next instant he was flying through the air to headlong destruction.

Bounding from a projecting rock upon which he struck, he flew outward, and with frightfully increasing momentum he spun round and round in his descent, until the centrifugal motion drew out his legs and neck as straight as a line. A few seconds of this multiplying velocity and - crash!

It was all over. The bitch had pulled up on the very brink of the precipice, but it was a narrow escape.

Sportsmen are contradictory creatures. If that buck had come to bay, I should have known no better sport than going in at him with the knife to the assistance of the pack; but I now felt a great amount of compassion for the poor brute who had met so terrible a fate. It did not seem fair; and yet I would not have missed such a sight for anything. Nothing can be conceived more terribly grand than the rush of so large an animal through the air; and it was a curious circumstance that within a few days no less than two bucks had gone over precipices, although I had never witnessed one such an accident more than once before.

Upon reaching the fatal spot, I, of course, found him lying stone dead. He had fallen at least two hundred and fifty feet to the base of the precipice; and the ground being covered with detached fragments of rock, he had broken most of his bones, beside bursting his paunch and smashing in the face. However, we cut him up and cleaned him, and, with the native followers heavily laden, we reached the tent.

The following morning I killed another fine buck after a good run on the patinas, where he was coursed and pulled down by the greyhounds; but the wind was so very high that it destroyed the pleasure of hunting. I therefore determined on another move - to the Matturatta Plains, within three miles of my present hunting ground.

After hunting four days at the Matturatta Plains, I moved on to the Elephant Plains, and from thence returned home after twelve days' absence, having killed twelve elk and two red deer.

(Editor：science)