82 NATURAL HISTORY IN ANECDOTE.

purpose, as a scavenger, devouring all the offal which comes
in its way, including the dead of his own species which no
other animal will touch. The hyzna can be tamed and
taught to follow its master and to hunt other animals.
The Striped Bruce tells the following story of the impudence
Hyena. of the striped hyena. “One night in Maitsha,
being very intent on observation, I heard something pass
behind me towards the bed, but upon looking round could
perceive nothing. Having finished what I was then about, I
went out of my tent, resolving directly to return, which I
immediately did, when I perceived large blue eyes glaring at
me in the dark. I called upon my servant with a light; and
there was the hyena standing nigh the head of the bed, with
two or three large bunches of candles in his mouth. To have
fired at him, I was in danger of breaking my quadrant or
other furniture; and he seemed, by keeping the candles steadily
in his mouth, to wish for no other prey at that time. As his
mouth was full, and he had no claws to tear with, I was not
afraid of him, but with a pike struck him as near the heart
as I could judge. It was not till then he showed any sign
of fierceness; but, upon feeling his wound, he let drop the
candles, and endeavoured to run up the shaft of the spear
to arrive at me; so that, in self-defence, I was obliged to draw
out a pistol from my girdle and shoot him, and nearly at the
same time my servant cleft his skull with a battle-axe. Ina
word, the hyzna was the plague of our lives, the terror of
our night-walks, the destruction of our mules and asses, which
above all others are his favourite food.”
The Spotted The spotted hyena belongs to South Africa
Hyens and seems to possess more daring than his cousin
of Abyssinia, and to show a greater preference for human
food. According to Mr. Stepstone, the Mambookies build
their houses in the form of a beehive from eighteen to twenty
feet in diameter, placing a raised platform at the back and
leaving the front-area for the accommodation of the calves —