At night they were bold enough, and came into the very camp; but then the darkness hindered a good aim, and the hunters knew too well the value of powder and lead to waste it on a chance shot, though now and then, when provoked by the brutes, they ventured one.
But some way must be thought of to thin the numbers of these animals, or get rid of them altogether.

This was the opinion of everybody.
Two or three kinds of traps were tried, but without much success.

A pit they could leap out of, and from a noose they could free themselves by cutting the rope with their sharp teeth! At length the field-cornet resorted to a plan--much practised by the boors of Southern Africa for ridding their farms of these and similar vermin.

It was the "gun-trap." Now there are several ways of constructing a gun-trap.

Of course a gun is the principal part of the mechanism, and the trigger pulled by a string is the main point of the contrivance.