CROCODILE SHOOTING 71 the bush. Silently the lumbering animals had departed ; the night had yielded no sound to us as we rested, and they had marched to some remembered spot where man was less likely to harass.

Ereif el Dik, across a long neck of land round which the river had almost doubled on itself, had been scorned by them and left to the crocodiles. The latter are by no means easy to recover when shot. One hears the bullet strike the hard armour with a sounding whack, causing what are apparently lifeless tree -stumps to waken into astounding, slithering activity, fretting the water into muddy waves as they seek refuge, and leaving one, perhaps, shot through brain or neck, writhing in its last agony. But more often, if the bullet has not touched an instantly vital spot, the movement of the tail causes the animal to be caught by the slow river-current, or is sufficient to take it entirely into the water in which it already half lies. Here the country is somewhat more undulating ; no hills relieve the landscape, but occasional deep khors tell of swift-rushing torrents, adding fury to the summer flood. What now are eminences by the side of the river, with gullies to landward, high above river-bed, are islands or shoals later on. The rise of the water is amazing, and at Singa, where the banks vary from 50 to 70 feet above water in winter, it becomes necessary to use a felucca to traverse the lower part of the town area.

At these times travel, even on service, is impracticable, and mankind stops at home, mending