With Flashlight and Rifle ^ 



trees antl bushes quiverino; this way and that. It was 

 heartdjreaking ! One instant sooner and both elephants 

 would have been lying dead in th(,' nuid. Animals 

 with tusks weighing two hundred pounds ! Ele))hants 

 such as have hardly fallen to any European hunter in the 

 whole length and l)readth of Africa ! 



The wind now going down, and the trees ceasing to 

 quiver, I slid down the ravine and made m\' way up the 

 opposite slope, all covered with mud and slime from the 

 branches through which the elephants had forced their 

 way, and got up cjn the top just as they entered the 

 thicket, through which they would probably continue their 

 flight for some hours. 



This sui)position was only too well foimded, as I 

 discovered alter an indescribably long pursuit without 

 results. Hardly ever in all my life had I been so covered 

 in slime and so unrecognisable as after this incident. 

 And the slime smelt of elephant to an unimaginable 

 deo-ree ! 



Forcing my way along in the undergrowth, with my 

 arms in front of me to jirotect my face, I got into such 

 a condition of dirt and brcathlessness antl utter disgust 

 over my failure as I had only once in my lite experienced 

 before. That was at Mlinstcr, in the "Old West|)halian " 

 steeplechase- — that most delightful of ;ill (ierman steeple- 

 chases — as they used to be run over the old difhcult course, 

 and wh(;n knee-deep in mud I h;id almost won, yet lost! 



I leave it to the reader to imagine m\- feelings. i^'or 

 weeks I had Ijeen after thes<' elephants in th(; hope ot 

 photographing them. Then came this long pursuit which 



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