54 HYENAS, before ; then we saw, one night, fully a hundred, quarrelling over the dead body of a donkey. Aylmer's horse died, and we dragged its body out on the sand, some little distance from our tents : we had cause to regret having done so, however, as night was rendered hideous by the frightful noises of these animals. Nothing of the horse was left by the morning. They are often very bold, and would not only come close to our tents, but one night one of them had the impudence to walk inside while we were in bed ; on another occasion, a hyaena absconded with one of a pair of hide sandals that had been left close by the tent-door.

Occasionally we shot one or two, whose attentions were a little too marked, in the neighbourhood of our camp ; but we soon learned that hyaenas were a part of the sanitary arrangements of Cassala, where the whole refuse of the town is thrown outside the walls, for these animals to devour at night. They live in holes in the ground, which they dig out for themselves ; and we frequently came across them. Although most cowardly animals, they are said sometimes to attack people, either when they can take them unawares, or when they are in very large numbers. A short time before we arrived in Cassala, a woman and child were killed by one as they lay asleep. The pariah dogs, too, were most troublesome. One night one of them entered our camp, and abstracted two sand-grouse pertaining to Ali. Suleiman caught the culprit, and begged us the next morning to allow him to "give dog kill;" suggesting, as a means of getting rid of the animal, to give him shield in stomach." Suleiman invariably confused a spear with a shield.

Cassala has for a long time been the headquarters of several Germans, who are engaged in collecting wild animals to sell in Europe to the various zoological societies and menageries. When we were there they had captured several young lions, an