-'»^ 71ic African Iilcphant 



fifty years ! Fifty years ago elephants and rhinoceroses 

 were still to be found in the districts now called German 

 South-West Africa ; earlier, both animals were to be found 

 in great numbers up to the coasts by Walfisch Bay. 



" In those times," wrote the famous hunter W, Cotton 

 Osvvell : " Vardon was the most enthusiastic rhinoceros- 

 hunter ; he filled his waggon with horns as I did mine 

 with ivorv ; he used to shoot tour or five every day." 



Those were the times when Oswell and others month 

 after month and da\- at\er day decimated the elephant- 

 herds in S(juth Africa, and when the Boers penetrated 

 farther and farther into the heart of the country and 

 eft'ected such a destruction of game as only can be 

 realised by those who, like myself, have had opportunities 

 of forming a mental picture of the condition ot things in 

 the primeval forests. 



What happened fifty years ago in South Africa is 

 now happening under the Equator ; about that there is 

 no doubt. Nowadays we unfortunately see black hunters 

 in the German Cameroons slaughtering elephants with 

 breech-loaders and with the sanction of the Government. 

 We can but delay the work of annihilation ; we cannot 

 stop it. The day is not far distant when it will be asked : 

 ''Quid novi ex Africa?'' And the reply will be: "The 

 last Africcm elephant has been killed." 



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