Moving to and fro she searched the spoor with her eyes, then rose with a sigh of joy.
Weary as she was, Noma followed the oldspoor backwards.
As I was examining the spoor of the game by the fountain, I suddenly detected an enormous old rock-snake stealing in beside a mass of rock beside me.
I found their spoor while walking ahead of the wagon, and following it up, I came upon a part of the herd feeding quietly in a dense part of the forest.
The lions had cleaned out all his entrails; their spoor [Footnote: Spoor, i.
We crossed the river, and at once took up the freshspoor of a troop of bull elephants.
I now pressed forward and urged them on; old Argyll and Bles took up hisspoor in gallant style and led on the other dogs.
After following the spoor for a couple of miles, we dropped it, as it led right away from camp.
Here the spoor of rhinoceros was extremely plentiful, and in every hole where they had drunk the print of the horn was visible.
I took John and Carey as after-riders, armed, and a party of the natives followed up the spoor and led the dogs.
Here we found abundance of spoor of a variety of game, and started several herds of the more common varieties.
As he followed rapidly downward toward the dead sea-bottom, where he knew he must lose the spoor in the resilient ochre vegetation, he was suddenly surprised to see a naked man approaching him from the north-east.
The outcome of the matter was that he gave the naked odwar leave to accompany him, and together they set out upon the spoor of Thuvia and Komal.
It was evident that he was following thespoor of meat by scent.
If it had been the devil's spoor it would matter about as much or as little," he replied, with huge and delighted contempt.
The spoorof the patrol was plain enough, but he remembered that the missing man suffered from fever, and had been slightly wounded during the earlier stages of the campaign.
Now he lifted his muzzle and sniffed the air, caught the acrid scent spoor of the reed buck and the heavy scent of man.
Tarzan had followed the spoorof the old man, the two hyenas, and the little black boy to the mouth of the cave in the rocky canon between the two hills.
The spoor was fresh, and now that they had passed from the range of the strong ape odor of the tribe he had little difficulty in following Toog and Teeka by scent alone.
Numa had hunted here the night just gone, and Horta, the boar, had walked slowly along the trail within an hour; but what held Tarzan's attention was the spoor tale of the Gomangani.
The dancer was painted and armed for the hunt and his movements and gestures suggested the search for the spoor of game.
Then Tarzan read in the spoor of the smaller Gomangani a shrinking terror of the beast that brushed his side, but in that of the old man was no sign of fear.
Once again the two took up the trail, but it was slow work now and there were many discouraging delays when the spoorseemed lost beyond recovery.
Taug and the others pressed forward, for the sound told them that the hunter had found the spoor of his quarry.
At first Tarzan had been solely occupied by the remarkable juxtaposition of the spoor of Dango and Gomangani, but now his keen eyes caught something in the spoor of the little Gomangani which brought him to a sudden stop.
He had learned to make a species of game out of it, following up the spoor of a new thought through the mazes of the many definitions which each new word required him to consult.
It was very strange and quite inexplicable, especially where the spoor showed where the hyenas in the wider portions of the path had walked one on either side of the human pair, quite close to them.
The spoor was easy to follow, for the dragged body of the victim left a plain trail, blood-spattered and scentful.
Tarzan pricked up his ears when he heard the voice of a great ape and, circling quickly until he was down wind from the trap, he sniffed at the air in search of the scent spoor of the prisoner.
And the rain did what Tarzan knew that it would do--it wiped the spoor of the quarry from the face of the earth.
We then sent the dogs to ascertain their whereabouts, for we knew there were at least two by their spoor on the sand.
However, he left them by the two dead wolves, and managed to strike the road, and saw the spoor of my waggon, and followed it down to where I was outspanned.
Otters are also plentiful but difficult to find, their spoor was everywhere to be seen on the banks.
After proceeding some few miles we came upon the remains of a quagga that had evidently been killed and eaten by the lions the previous night, as their spoor on the sand was very fresh.
As the sun was now above the horizon, we gave orders for our boys to outspan, and then hastened on in the direction the lion's spoor showed us he had gone.
Three of my boys, myself and two dogs, followed the spoor for several hundred yards.
After some little trouble about the camp, where the trail was much mingled with others, he presently got the spoor away into the bush, to the west of the outspan.
Meanwhile the two hunters rode steadily upon the spoor of the hartebeest.
Yet in the last few days, luck had turned; they had stumbled by chance upon a veldt thick with elephants; they had slain three yesterday and were now hot upon the spoor of an immense troop, which on the coming morning they hoped to attack.
Now and again they crossed the neat spoor of the antelopes, imprinted deep in the smooth, red, sandy soil.
They sat talking in low, subdued tones until dawn, and then, taking up the spoor of the wild man, ran the trail down to a cavern among the rocks, where the poor creature had made its lair.
On one occasion he believed he had seen a figure move quickly past him in the darkness, and the horses had been disturbed at the same time; but nothing further could be traced and no spoor of man or quadruped was ever discovered.
We followed the blood spoor for five mortal hours, and but for Marati I should have given it up as a bad job.
But no; the spoor still held straight ahead, and in half an hour they were at the entrance of the kloof.
The man, said the Bakalahari, was following the spoor of Strangeways, and had got off his horse for the purpose.
With extraordinary pains they picked their way, thespoor still guiding them.
The spoor had told the hunters very plainly that the antelopes had entered the kloof.
He and September, taking up the spoor of the wanderer, had followed it hour after hour into the parched forest country.
There were traces of the Italian and his horse about the spot, and then the murderer's spoor led away northward.
The man is alive, that is certain, his spoor plainly tells that tale.
Before now I have proved myself a pretty good hand at tracking the spoor of Kaffirs, and it's hard if I can't pick up this trail somehow.
He knew that for the odor of Apeman, and a thrill of exaltation encompassed him as he realized that he was following a spoor by the cunning of his nostrils.
Bentley did not know that he himself could follow the spoor of Apeman, for he had not yet analyzed all of his new capabilities.
There were also to our surprise the spoor and droppings of oxen.
The dust of the track was thick with the spoor of wild cats, wolves, the blue wildebeest, and at rare intervals of wild ostrich.
Mr Ericsen said that he was no hunter, but promised to let them have his dogs and natives to follow up the spoor in the morning.
Among the spoor on the track was that of a large lion going towards Taqui.
A mile or so up we came on another pool, which was evidently the drinking-place of the bush, for the edges were trodden with the spoor of pig and monkey and a few large buck.
One strange peculiarity of the coastal desert is the extraordinary persistence of spoor and other markings on the surface of the ground.
I scribbled a note asking Andries to follow on our spoor with the wagon.
No more will your keen and faithful eyes hold my vagrant spoor over sand and kanya.
Crossing our sandy pathway we occasionally noticed the spoor of a leopard, a badger or a snake.
The spoor was quite fresh; it could not have been more than half an hour since the herd had passed.
Even then I had to bend down and trace, step by step, my spoor of the previous night.
The hail showers had been so heavy that all spoorwas obliterated; accordingly we could not tell whether game was about or not.
At last we saw signs of game, for we crossed the spoor of several small troops of springbuck; these had apparently been making in the direction of Kamiebies.
But how large the spoor was; it suggested blesbuck rather than springbuck.
That day our hunting was to be northward, for thither all the oryx spoor trended.
As soon as ever day broke the spoor of the missing man was found and followed.
In hot weather one may trace the zigzag spoor of many a yellow cobra across the sands.
Suddenly the spoor curved towards a gap in the right-hand dune.
After resting there until daylight they would take on the spoor of the cart through the dunes.
He was all right now; he had only been afraid of his spoor being found.
The hunters who made the running at the beginning, and who now come slowly along on the spoor of the chase, pick the carcases up, one by one.
It is a peculiarity of the Desert sand that if the wind has not happened to blow hard it retains a spoordistinctly for weeks, or even months.
More and more the spoortrended towards Bantom Berg.
I don't care for hunting spooks, Baas, which leave no spoorthat you can follow and are always behind when you think they are in front.
As it was, however, he was convinced that by following the course I had mapped out we had lost their spoor finally and that probably they were now three days' march away in another direction.
At this spot we were obliged to stay till daybreak, since it was impossible to follow the spoor by night, a circumstance that gave the cannibals a great advantage over us.
He was sure, he added, that the valley which he had suggested we should follow, was one full of game, inasmuch as he had seen their spoor at its entrance.
His spoor he distinguished from that of the others both by an occasional drop of blood and because he walked lightly on his right foot, doubtless for the reason that he wished to avoid jarring his wound, which was on that side.
At length we lost the spoor altogether; not a sign of it was to be found.
He heard and, although of course he did not believe that I had lost the spoor on purpose, stared at me till I thought his little eyes were going to drop out of his head.
The spoor was utterly lost on that stony ground, or if any traces of it remained a heavy deluge of rain had washed them away.
Then I came to seek you, following the outward spoor of the waggons which I could not have done well at night.
Here again we struck a sea of reeds in which, after casting about, Hans once more found the spoor of the Amahagger.
It did indeed, since before nightfall, following the spoor of those Amahagger, we had plunged into a morass so vast that in all my experience I have never seen or heard of its like.
As there was no spoor upon it, they followed this track backwards, expecting to find the waggon outspanned, but although they rode for mile upon mile, no waggon could they see.
Indeed, this it seemed necessary to do, since they had struck the fresh spoor of lions, and even caught sight of one galloping away in the tall reeds on the marshy land at the foot of the hill.
There was no lack of spoor to guide them in their pursuit of him, his fresh footmarks in the muddy soil were only too apparent to all; and away started two score of fierce warriors upon his track.
Just bring some of the dogs up--there's a blood spoor as wide as a footpath.
One was that not a shadow of spoor was seen to lead into it; another, a very natural repugnance to penetrating deep into that gloomy hole.
Then as they strike the scent of the wild pig, they rush off on the spoor with full-throated chorus.
What the Baas does you do--and here be the spoor of an impala buck.
I have been up yonder," he said, "following your spoor backwards.
On the surface of the ground or through the swaying branches of the trees the spoor of man or beast was an open book to the ape-man, but even his acute senses were baffled by the spoorless trail of the airship.
A short distance beyond the point at which they had surrounded him, Tarzan came to the trail again and sought for the spoor of Bertha Kircher and Lieutenant Smith-Oldwick.
To have reached this spot he must have come by some trail unknown to me--at least I crossed no game trail and no spoor of any animal after I came over the hills out of the fertile country.
A well-defined scent spoor might never be forgotten by a beast if it had first been sensed under unusual circumstances, and so Tarzan was confident that Numa's nose had already reminded him of all the circumstances of their brief connection.
Sniffing at the ground that Tarzan's feet had barely touched, Numa's growl changed to a low whine, for he had recognized the scent spoor of the man-thing that had rescued him from the pit of the Wamabos.
It is not the spoor of the Gomangani," he said, "nor is it exactly like that of white men.
The spoor lay directly along the trail for another half-mile when the way suddenly debouched from the forest into open land and there broke upon the astonished view of the ape-man the domes and minarets of a walled city.
They were the footsteps of a creature who walked upon two legs, and though Tarzan could catch no scent spoor from that direction he knew that a man was approaching.
He knew from the strength of the scent spoor and the rate of the wind about how far away she was and that she was approaching from behind him.
In the North of England they still speak of the sermon with which Joseph Spoor transported multitudes into the circumstances of that awful hour.
We saw a great deal of fresh spoor to-day, so that we may hope the deer are beginning to come to our part of the country: perhaps the poor things have been very much bullied in other places.
Moreover, they had detected among the most recent spoor that of lions; and for the sake of their cattle they preferred to keep at a respectful distance from a place frequented by such formidable animals.
In the first place there was no tree with sufficient foliage to afford him cover; in the second, he was not in any tree within sight; in the third, the spoor did not lead up to the foot of any tree.
The spoor seemed to come abruptly to an end--as if the fugitive had been whisked up to the skies.
The spoor no more led to the river than it did to any tree.
His enemies had taken up the spoor and had followed it thither.
Once there, however, they promptly lighted upon the spoor leading away from it, and were at that very moment engaged in signalling the discovery to the residue of the band below.
After the search had been continued for nearly two hours, a spoor was at length found that was unmistakably that of a camelopard.
Do you think, Congo, we had better follow the spoor we made in coming here?
In every copse could be seen some trees with torn branches, and twigs cut off, an evidence that they had been browsed upon by the camelopards; while the spoor of these animals appeared in many places along the edge of the stream.
Such were the thoughts that tortured him, as he urged Congo and the dog to greater haste, in following the spoor through the forest.
But can you be sure that he is following the spoor of Willem's horse?
By that time, the heavy rain had obliterated the spoor so completely that even Spoor'em, the hound, could only follow it with great difficulty.
We have not yet seen the spoorof either hippopotamus or giraffe.
They rode up, and were again shown the spoor of Arend's horse leading away from where its carcass was now lying, and in the opposite direction from the camp.
Of course it was the spoor of the camelopards when first led up on the evening before.
But for more than a mile, after the most careful examination, nospoor of giraffe, old or young, was to be seen.
Not that I care a straw for him, the ungrateful wretch, but that we may be unable to find the spoor of the giraffes, not having him with us.
To these ancient inhabitants of the mimosa forest, the Bushman ascribed the spoor and other signs of giraffes that had been seen.
From his knowledge of Willem, Hans was certain that once on the spoor he would never leave it as long as he had strength to continue.
A Hottentot then might see him, think something was the matter, and perhaps spoor me to where I lay.
The Hottentots, finding the blood-spoor of the wounded leopard, feared that I had attacked him again, and that he had killed me.
Monyosi, his brother, and my Kaffir Inyovu, were with me across the Umganie one morning, when we came upon the fresh spoor of a single buffalo.
I wiped my honeyed hands and walked through the forest; we shortly came on the fresh spoor of some cow-elephants, which were attended by their calves.
They followed the spoor of the elephant through an open park-like country, a few scattered bushes and trees being the only cover.
I walked quietly up the banks of the Imvoti for nearly three miles, but saw no signs of Hippo himself, although the spoor was very plentiful.
We had gone in after elephants, and were on their spoor of the previous night.
The Kaffirs had seen the spoor before, but had no name by which to designate it.
We followed this spoor for some distance; but the blood soon ceasing, and the wounded elephant's traces being crossed by other feet, we saw no more of him.
Monyosi followed the spoor with great accuracy; he had taken the dimensions of the feet of the wounded animal, and could therefore recognise the prints on every doubtful occasion.
On the next day Monyosi followed the spoor of the two that I had wounded, but failed in coming up with them.
I once saw its spoor on the sand, and judged that it must be nearly thirty feet long.
We got the spoor immediately, and, partly by that and partly by the aid of the dogs, we drew up to some rocky hills, that presented anything but a favourable ground for galloping.
The spoor was very neatly taken up by Monyosi, who noticed it on some very hard and difficult ground, where it would have been totally invisible to unskilled eyes.
If he cuts the spoor again farther on, he knows that Bruin has not yet halted, so another circle must be described.
But if the ski-er comes back to the first line of spoor without having crossed it again, then "honey paws" must be within his circuit.
In the early morning light we crossed the deep river-bed of the Umchingwe River, and, in doing so, we noticed the freshspoor of a lion in the sand.
And then the humbled coolies went back to look at the spoor again, and there they saw, after a close scrutiny, the delicate tracing of a little field-rat's feet over the mighty pugs of Stripes.
On the roads of a populous country, passengers, animals, and vehicles succeed each other so rapidly that no continuous spoor of any one of them remains; but it is otherwise in the desert and the wilderness.
