for conduct on the sod. And when he alighted from "the leathern conveniency" on the battle-ground, he was a sadder, but not a wiser, man than when he had mounted the vehicle.

I have been present at half a score duels in my youth, but this I shall never forget. The Colonel sate in the carriage until all the preparations were completed, pistols loaded, ground measured, and firing signal agreed upon. An Irish duel was then fashionable and well attended. Admirers of both combatants were numerous; and at the twilight of a December morning, there were an hundred of the Montagues and Capulets upon the ground. Some of them must have been on the road half the night; for after a drive of fifteen or twenty miles, there they were affectionately in waiting.

Where people understand their trade, as Napoleon used to observe of his generals, it is marvellous how quickly matters are concluded. The Colonel's assistant was profoundly ignorant of all appertaining to the duello; but the Ensign's was a pearl above price, and his experience at once brought conclusions to the issue. The commander was informed in a very tremulous voice by the little Scotchman, that "all was ready," and, assisted by a brace of loving friends, he descended from the vehicle. During the preliminaries his ex-Adjutant had not risen in his estimation, and at the termination of the combat, Johnny T was in worse favour than when more than once before he had mobbed the regiment. The pistols were presented; the word to fire was given; the Colonel had covered his lean opponent accurately. The Ensign, with excellent taste, had declined to practise at the bombard he was opposed to. The commander's ball passed through his opponent's hat, carrying with it the whole of the white silk lining, and, at the same time, nearly disloeating his own wrist. In fact, the poor little Scotchman had, from ignorance and alarm, over-loaded the weapon four-fold; and yet he did the state some service. The ball, as a consequence, rose; and a most correct line of fire, on the Colonel's part, demolished a bad hat in place of popping into a pericranium. His young antagonist instantly advanced, and offered a manly apology. It was as manfully received, and the combatants repaired to the dwelling of the Ensign's friend very lovingly, and in the Colonel's equipage.

Although a perfect reconciliation touching the salt-spoons had been fortunately effected, the Scotch Adjutant never was forgiven; and feelingly would the poor Colonel, over his fifth tumbler, complain of the number of valuable members of society who had gone to their accounts through the instrumentality of a stupid second like Johnny T

"Between every twinge of gout as we went along," he said, "I told the little scoundrel that for a bore of four-and-twenty, and a patent breech, a pinch of powder was sufficient. Look what a kettle of fish he made of it."

"Well, my dear Colonel, was it not all the better in the end? K-escaped from being made a ghost, and you from holding up your hand at the next assizes."

"Faith! Mr., I believe you're right."

"I'm sure I am. Now, Colonel, from your amplitude of condition, no man who could hit a turf-stack could miss you; and if little Johnny had profited by your instructions, and only used a pinch of powder, instead of doing mortal damage to a hat, you would have injured a head

irreparably. And What would they say in England?' as the Iron Duke observed on the day of Waterloo. Why that you were just worth a salt-spoon a head."

"Did you ever see a shot directed so clean between the eyes ? May Cromwell's curse alight upon you, Johnny Taylor!"

"Never mind, Johnny Taylor. I hear that the woods under Benmore are full of cocks. The devil take all salt-spoons, but for them I should have been able to have despatched a basket to London by this mail. And, Colonel, if you could but see the fair applicant ! one glance of her hazel eye would be worth ten thousand salt-spoons!"

A heavy twitch of gout interrupted the rejoinder. The commander repaired to bed, and I to Curnigashlawn. That evening I bagged fifteen couple and a half, and redeemed my promise next day by their transmission to as sweet a girl as ever committed murder in the parterre of the opera by a killing smile from a side-box.

A DAY'S SPORT IN SOUTH AFRICA.

BY VENATOR.

"Did you ever shoot an elephant?" demanded Forbes Grattan, my next neighbour, in our moonlit bivouac by a pleasant Kaffrarian stream, beside which Babylonian willows wept and fan-palms trembled. "Never had the honour to shoot anything half as big as myself, save one unhappy red-deer which put itself in the way of my bullet once on a time, on the shores of Loch Etive," I replied, feeling very small indeed in the presence of those who talked of lions and elephants as though they were every-day acquaintances.

"Then are you less fortunate than W--,' continued the former speaker; "for he is the man that can kill an elephant out of hand, and think nothing of it; and that, too, with a common gun-not one of those huge roers' (elephant guns) made to level death at the monsters, but a mere fowling-piece such as might be carried by any gentleman of ordinary dimensions. Have you never heard the story?"

"What, are you that noted sportsman !" I exclaimed, turning to a quiet, unassuming individual, who, despite such demeanour, had more true adventures to relate, and told them better than any other of the party. "I had read of the exploit long before I thought of betaking myself to this side of the equator, but did not know you were its hero." The person addressed looked down shyly, like a girl rallied on her first conquest.

"And at that

The worst of it is," said he, laughing, "the tale is not rightly told; I am of the number that have greatness thrust upon them. "But there was an elephant ?" said I inquiringly. "As I had nearly found to my cost," was the reply. time, too, there were a good many haunting the bush which runs along our frontier like a hedge, for all sorts of wild beasts, both bipeds and quadrupeds, to lurk in. Often have I seen them go forth in troops on

the lofty plains adjoining the jungle, stalking majestically over those flattened hills as though they were undisputed monarchs of the land. But within the last few years they have well nigh vanished; seldom are they to be seen within the colony or on its borders, a stray foot-print here and there alone proving that some yet wander through their old domains, and elephant-hunting, with all its pleasures, has departed far into the interior. It was otherwise when one day I halted in the bush with a small detachment of men under my command. Suddenly crash! crash! crash! was heard; young trees and vigorous branches were bent and snapped like twigs, and a large elephant burst in upon us without further warning. The soldiers stood between the intruder and myself, but he dashed through them instantly, scattering them right and left like frightened antelopes, and made for me direct.

At

"It was no time for heroics; fly or be killed was the choice, and very dubious the issue. Off ran I and the elephant after me, I threading the bush as best I might in my headlong course, my pursuer bearing down before him all which obstructed his destroying path. first I thought I might be winner of the race, but that delusion quickly vanished; the crackling, crashing, splintering of bough and sapling, and the groaning of tougher stems as they refused to be so broken, all came closer and closer to my ear, and to my mind grew plainer and plainer the doom which they foreboded. To think was not to pause, so on we went; while slowly, but surely too, my giant foe gained on my steps, and in imagination I could see his huge proboscis stretched forth to grasp and cast me high into the air, and could see the tusks which were to receive my falling form, and the feet which were to trample it into its parent dust, and could, in my mind's eye, view the whole proceeding. On my honour, it must take a world of courage for a man to act a coward's part: running away is the greatest trial to the nerves I am acquainted with; the unseen danger, which you cannot look on, assumes so terrible a form; and imagination becoming your tyrant, tortures you with wanton cruelty."

46

Come, come, W--, don't grow sentimental; keep that for the fair Desdemonas who love you, for the dangers you have known," interrupted Mark Doubleitt, the greatest long-bow drawer between his own grassy lounge and the nearest Kafir kraal.

"Think you it resembles one of your own stories?" slily inquired a gallant little sportsman, who needed no exaggeration of his exploits ; and amid the general smile W-- proceeded:

I

"At length I emerged on a sunny glade, and springing into the open space felt for a moment like a bird escaped from its cage. But the elephant broke cover also, and I could hear even him treading more rapidly on the uncumbered grass; he was nearer than ever. In despair I plunged again into the bush; he followed, and tramp, tramp came those loud heavy footsteps-closer, aye, and swifter, it seemed, than ever. felt that a few minutes must decide my fate, but did not doubt what it would be. The only shadow of a hope was in my gun, which I had grasped firmly all along, though feeling it a weak defence, the delay occasioned by using which would most certainly ensure destruction. But I had nothing now to lose. I turned; my pursuer was close upon me, and I fired. Then, without waiting to discover the effects of the shot, I turned again and fled more swiftly than before, fully expecting that

the infuriated animal would rush after me with even increased ferocity. I heard a loud crash echo through the woods, caught up from kloof to kloof (ravine), as it passed along, until I could not tell if it were close behind or far distant. This was followed, after a minute, by the loud hallooing of my men, who had gained the heights. shouting at the top of their voices, and, as it appeared, to warn me of the elephant's more close pursuit; and the louder they hallooed the faster I ran, and the faster I ran it seemed the louder they hallooed; and for some minutes the noise and my own rapid pace were too confusing for me to discover that there was no longer that heavy tramping in my rear. At last I found that all was silent, and that I was alone. From some cause or other my foe had disappeared. I climbed a hill, and proceeding along the higher ground, returned to where the race, or chase, if you prefer it, first began. And on examining the scene of its abrupt termination, it was discovered that my bullet had pierced the very centre of the elephant's forehead, and entering the brain terminated his existence also, of which occurrence the men's shouts were intended to apprize me. A traveller says in his book that I took such skilful aim. Heaven help the man! I had no time to waste on what I should have considered so useless a particularity, for never did I dream of chancing to hit a vulnerable spot. That every bullet has its billet, is the only explanation I can give of an incident which has been the means of crowning me with sporting laurels I have no right to wear.'

"Pleasant adventure, very," observed Grattan. "The greatest fault in autobiography is, that one never feels properly uneasy about the hero. We know the end before the beginning, and are perfectly satisfied that, whatever his dangers and tribulations, he will get safely through them all. And now let's have one bottle more to our success on the morrow, and may none of us exemplify the world turned upside down,' by being hunted instead of hunters."

The toast was drunk, and within the hour silence and sleep hushed all lips and wrapped all thoughts beside that southern stream.

The morrow's sun rose bright and cloudless, but long ere he had darted his fiery beams over the horizon of undulating hills, we were astir, and, mounted each on his Rosinante, were wending our way up and down the steep defiles and along the green valleys and gazelle-frequented plains of that wild territory. Every country owns its little whimsicalities of attire, especially on such occasions; and I would I could have daguerreotyped the party when thus sallying forth to challenge the sovereigns of the wilderness in the dress usually worn for sport or travel. Shooting jackets and krackers (deer-skin trousers) were in universal favour; but the grand feature of the costume, and that in whose elegant arrangement the wearer's taste possessed full scope, was the broad-brimmed, low-crowned" boer's hat," made of common felt, and light as possible; in the narrow band encircling which are placed, droopingly, as many ostrich feathers, innocent of dye or dressing, as the owner desires to bear aloft. Some are content with few, others patronize numbers; but, on the whole, the head-gear is lost in its adornments, and at a distance the person appears surmounted by a feathery pile, which dances and flutters as he moves. There is sense as well as singularity in this umbrageous canopy, which not merely shelters the brow from the fierce beating of rays which oftentimes shoot down with well-nigh tro

pical intensity, but the light waving of the feathers dispenses a slight coolness when perchance the scorched and scorching air sleeps calmly as an usurer's conscience, and at the same time scares away the myriads of flies which might otherwise gather round him. Some persons when travelling adopt a green circular veil as a defence against these insects; but, to say nothing of its effeminacy, it is a suffocating expedient in such a climate; and whether it be an ill-omen or not, I have a mortal antipathy to anything which puts one in mind of strangulation. Then there were our active, little, sure-footed horses, far from faultless in form, but commendable in education, with each a sheep-skin receptacle for a gun depending from the saddle, lest the rider should weary of carrying it. And there were our swarthy attendants also, a motley group, sitting their horses as though they had learned to ride before they walked-undersized Hottentots and stalwart Kafirs, and a stray bushman, one of that genus of humanity so very rarely to be found even among the localities to which they have given a name, with their strange Chinese set eyes, symmetrical proportions, and restless, untameable dispositions. This dwarfish curiosity-a man in years, although in size a child-was in the keeping of Grattan, whom he followed faithfully on all roving excursions like the present, though at other times he would often absent himself for weeks together.

It was on lion-hunting we were bent, but so far we had not so much as discovered the foot-print of one upon the softest sand beside the most enticing stream, though all the previous day we had wandered through their accustomed haunts. A couple of rhee-boks and a straggling gnu were all that for some hours that morning fell beneath our prowess, and fear began to creep over our spirits lest we were destined to return merely to tell of the deeds we would have done had fate permitted us.

"I remember," said Doubleitt-by way, I suppose, of consolation"going out one morning, in India, and shooting three tigers before breakfast."

"You were keeping the Ramazan, then, I fancy," commented Grattan, "and broke your fast after sundown.'

"And in three shots, too," proceeded Doubleitt; "but then my gun was a superb one. Never took it out without killing something worth while."

“Would you had it here," sighed W

"Wish I had. But I unfortunately broke it one day, on the back of a crocodile."

“Oh, spur on, spur on, in mercy!" exclaimed the little sportsman, "something is being thrust down my throat here which will surely choke me."

We spurred on up the pass, and while Doubleitt vainly endeavoured to secure an ear into which to pour the remainder of his story, we quickly gained the brow of a low hill, whence an easy descent led into one of the pleasantest hollows-valley it could scarce be called-to be found even in a land abounding in such sylvan spots. Around, as far as might be seen from the slight eminence on which we drew bridle for a moment, all was wild, bold scenery; rugged hills of every imaginable size and shape crowding on each other, and barren plains, bounded in the distance by ta" mountains, which raised their clearly defined sum