In my experience such men are without fear. I will never forget the day that the old Bushman, Jack, led me into tall grass after a wounded leopard. He carried a ropy network of scars from another encounter with Old Spots, but he stepped into the grass without hesitation, wearing a smile and carrying a panga. I had the gun, so I had little choice but to follow. As it were, the leopard came out under my feet. I hit it twice with buckshot and failed to stop it, and had just enough time for two thoughts: 1) The gun is empty. 2) This is gonna hurt. Russ Broom stopped the charging leopard at my feet with his double .500. When the leopard appeared, Jack the Bushman evaporated from in front of me, which was his job, and when the shooting stopped he was at my left shoulder, ready to do what he could with his panga if necessary.

Sadly, the hunting tribes that produced such great men are dying out. The children of Makanyanga and Sengi are schoolteachers and drivers and mechanics, and are not following the old ways. But there remains interest and raw talent, and the reason these old men still do full safari seasons is so they can teach the young trackers.

There are still legends. Mukassa and Lumuc, Shonas of the Zambezi Valley, are such legends. They deserve their fame, but it is perhaps more pronounced because the Shonas are primarily farmers, not traditional hunters. Both are extremely intelligent, not only understanding the ways of the bush, but also using their brains and incredibly developed sixth senses to think through to the next step.

Lumuc is the expert at baiting leopard, and unlike most hunters of leopard, he eats his quarry with great relish, believing it gives him deeper insight into this most cunning of cats. Mukassa is the master tracker, accepted as the best elephant hunter in the whole Zambezi. Individually, they are awesome. As a team, they are matchless. I bristle when it is even suggested that such men might run out of fear. They might run out of common sense, but men such as these have no fear, only confidence.

Last year Mukassa, who tracks only for Bill Bedford and Andrew Dawson, took Andrew on the spoor of a wounded buffalo, gut-shot by a client. The trail led from one thicket to another, and the shadows were growing long. Mukassa says he heard a bird, but no one else heard a bird. I've seen Mukassa see birds that were real, and birds that no one else saw. Perhaps it is his way of explaining what cannot be explained. He pointed ahead and told Andrew in their common Shona, "Boss, he is in there."

This thicket looked no different than the last half-dozen thickets, but in the bush only a fool would question Mukassa. Dawson motioned the rest of the party to stay back, and he and Mukassa approached. The bull was there, and when he burst from cover at ten yards, he was already under a full head of steam. Dawson stopped him with his old William Evans .470. He had the gun--the only gun. Did Mukassa run? No. As they approached the thicket, Mukassa, probably knowing the buffalo would charge, stayed side-by-side with his boss and friend, behind the muzzles of the double. When the buffalo came, Mukassa, with no words spoken, took one step back and placed a steadying hand on Andrew's shoulder. They would come through together, as they had many times before--or they would not.

A man like Mukassa, or Lumuc, or Salum, or Sengi, or Makanyanga, or Muindi, or Musili, or old Jack the Bushman, or the hundreds of other great trackers all across Africa, might get out of the way, but these men and others like them will not run. It isn't important that they don't have the gun, but it matters a great deal that he trust the man who does.