Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850.

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Various. Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850.

PILGRIMAGE TO THE HOME OF SIR THOMAS MORE

A BUFFALO CHASE

EARTH'S HARVESTS

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE LATE PRESIDENT

ENCOUNTER WITH A LIONESS

THE YOUNG ADVOCATE

THE REVOLUTIONISM OF MIRABEAU

THE "COMMUNIST" SPARROW – AN ANECDOTE OF CUVIER

A GIRAFFE CHASE

ADVENTURE IN A TURKISH HAREM

THE WIFE OF KONG TOLV.14

MAURICE TIERNAY, THE SOLDIER OF FORTUNE

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

HAVE GREAT POETS BECOME IMPOSSIBLE?18

RECOLLECTIONS OF THOMAS CAMPBELL

GALILEO AND HIS DAUGHTER

EBENEZER ELLIOTT

CONFLICT WITH AN ELEPHANT

LETTICE ARNOLD

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

RECOLLECTIONS OF DR. CHALMERS

THE OLD MAN'S BEQUEST; A STORY OF GOLD

ELEPHANT SHOOTING

THE POWER OF MERCY

BORAX LAGOONS OF TUSCANY

WALLACE AND FAWDON

PART THE FIRST

PART THE SECOND

WHAT BECOMES OF ALL THE CLEVER CHILDREN?

LACK OF POETRY IN AMERICA

SIR ROBERT PEEL

SPONGES

THE RAILWAY WORKS AT CREWE

STEAM-BRIDGE OF THE ATLANTIC

THE LITTLE HERO OF HAARLEM

ADVENTURE WITH A SNAKE

MONTHLY RECORD OF CURRENT EVENTS

LITERARY NOTICES

SUMMER FASHIONS

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Early on the 4th we inspanned and continued our march for Booby, a large party of savages still following the wagons. Before proceeding far I was tempted by the beautiful appearance of the country to saddle horses, to hunt in the mountains westward of my course. I directed the wagons to proceed a few miles under guidance of the natives, and there await my arrival. I was accompanied by Isaac, who was mounted on the Old Gray, and carried my clumsy Dutch rifle of six to the pound. Two Bechuanas followed us, leading four of my dogs. Having crossed a well wooded strath, we reached a little crystal river, whose margin was trampled down with the spoor of a great variety of heavy game, but especially of buffalo and rhinoceros. We took up the spoor of a troop of buffaloes, which we followed along a path made by the heavy beasts of the forest through a neck in the hills; and emerging from the thicket, we beheld, on the other side of a valley, which had opened upon us, a herd of about ten huge bull buffaloes. These I attempted to stalk, but was defeated by a large herd of zebras, which, getting our wind, charged past and started the buffaloes. I ordered the Bechuanas to release the dogs; and spurring Colesberg, which I rode for the first time since the affair with the lioness, I gave chase. The buffaloes crossed the valley in front of me, and made for a succession of dense thickets in the hills to the northward. As they crossed the valley by riding hard I obtained a broadside shot at the last bull, and fired both barrels into him. He, however, continued his course, but I presently separated him, along with two other bulls, from the troop. My rifle being a two-grooved, which is hard to load, I was unable to do so on horseback, and followed with it empty, in the hope of bringing them to bay. In passing through a grove of thorny trees I lost sight of the wounded buffalo; he had turned short and doubled back, a common practice with them when wounded. After following the other two at a hard gallop for about two miles, I was riding within five yards of their huge broad sterns. They exhaled a strong bovine smell, which came hot in my face. I expected every minute that they would come to bay, and give me time to load; but this they did not seem disposed to do. At length, finding I had the speed of them, I increased my pace; and going ahead, I placed myself right before the finest bull, thus expecting to force him to stand at bay; upon which he instantly charged me with a low roar, very similar to the voice of a lion. Colesberg neatly avoided the charge, and the bull resumed his northward course. We now entered on rocky ground, and the forest became more dense as we proceeded. The buffaloes were evidently making for some strong retreat. I, however, managed with much difficulty to hold them in view, following as best I could through thorny thickets. Isaac rode some hundred yards behind, and kept shouting to me to drop the pursuit, or I should be killed. At last the buffaloes suddenly pulled up, and stood at bay in a thicket, within twenty yards of me. Springing from my horse, I hastily loaded my two-grooved rifle, which I had scarcely completed when Isaac rode up and inquired what had become of the buffaloes, little dreaming that they were standing within twenty yards of him. I answered by pointing my rifle across his horse's nose, and letting fly sharp right and left at the two buffaloes. A headlong charge, accompanied by a muffled roar, was the result. In an instant I was round a clump of tangled thorn-trees; but Isaac, by the violence of his efforts to get his horse in motion, lost his balance, and at the same instant, his girths giving way, himself, his saddle, and big Dutch rifle, all came to the ground together, with a heavy crash right in the path of the infuriated buffaloes. Two of the dogs, which had fortunately that moment joined us, met them in their charge, and, by diverting their attention, probably saved Isaac from instant destruction. The buffaloes now took up another position in an adjoining thicket. They were both badly wounded, blotches and pools of blood marking the ground where they had stood. The dogs rendered me assistance by taking up their attention, and in a few minutes these two noble bulls breathed their last beneath the shade of a mimosa grove. Each of them in dying repeatedly uttered a very striking, low, deep moan. This I subsequently ascertained the buffalo invariably utters when in the act of expiring.

On going up to them I was astonished to behold their size and powerful appearance. Their horns reminded me of the rugged trunk of an oak-tree. Each horn was upward of a foot in breadth at the base, and together they effectually protected the skull with a massive and impenetrable shield. The horns, descending and spreading out horizontally, completely over-shadowed the animal's eyes, imparting to him a look the most ferocious and sinister that can be imagined. On my way to the wagons I shot a stag sassayby, and while I was engaged in removing his head a troop of about thirty doe pallahs cantered past me, followed by one princely old buck. Snatching up my rifle, I made a fine shot, and rolled him over in the grass.

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These were the last words he uttered; the priest, who had been summoned in haste, held up the cross before his failing sight; a few strong convulsions shook the poor bruised and mangled frame; and then all was still.

And thus ended the Young Advocate's Wedding Day.

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