The Elephant 7 



puted, and concerning which many opinions have been 

 recorded — all dogmatic, and most of them contradictory. 

 Suppose that a homicidal elephant catches a fugitive whom 

 he pursues, how does he kill him, and is he invariably 

 destroyed ? The subject stated does not amount to much 

 in itself, but some points will appear in the course of a 

 brief inquiry into it that merit attention. All writers who 

 held to the instinctive hypothesis, and imagined that 

 brutes only acted in a predetermined way, have taken 

 exclusive views of this matter. When a man is overtaken 

 by an elephant many say he is always killed. Sanderson, 

 for example, says so. Captain Wedderburn was killed. 

 Professor Wahlberg was killed. Everybody is killed ; it 

 cannot be otherwise. Nevertheless, Colonel Walter Camp- 

 bell ("The Old Forest Ranger") saw a companion emerge 

 from beneath the feet of a rogue elephant, and Major 

 Leveson and Major Blayney Walshe ("Sporting and Mili- 

 tary Adventures in Nepaul") relate the incidents of like 

 cases. Henry Courtney Selous ("A Hunter's Wanderings 

 in Africa") lived to tell how this same good fortune attended 

 himself ; and Lieutenant Moodie was actually trampled in 

 the presence of several witnesses, and yet, although con- 

 siderably injured, escaped with his life. 



These were, of course, very unusual instances, and it 

 is undeniable that most people whom elephants catch 

 are killed. But how.-* Pressed to death with one of the 

 animal's forefeet, one authority declares ; with both of 

 them, another insists ; kicked forwards and backwards 

 between the hind and front legs till reduced to a pulp, 

 maintains a third ; transfixed with the tusks, kneeled upon, 



