lyo A HUNTER^S WANDERINGS ch. 



feeding on the dark green leaves of a shrub, with 

 the name of which 1 am unacquainted ; he was 

 standing with his wounded foot doubled backwards, 

 and just resting with the point of the toe on the 

 ground, leaning all his weight on the other foot. 

 The second elephant, whose spoor we had seen, I 

 then made out standing about twenty yards to the 

 lett. It appeared to be a halt-grown beast, with 

 tusks of about 6 or 7 lbs. weight — not worth 

 shooting — who knows ^ perhaps it was a young 

 sweetheart who had voluntarily left the herd to 

 tend her injured lord, whose game leg, no doubt, 

 had caused him to separate from his comrades. As 

 I looked, she raised some sand with her trunk, and 

 poured it on to the back of her head, just between 

 the ears. Why she did this I leave to some wiser 

 man than myself to determine, but do it she did. 

 P'earing a sudden eddy of wind, which was now 

 favourable, I at once, without waiting for the Kafirs, 

 took my gun, and crept cautiously forwards on my 

 hands and knees, determined to get as near as possible, 

 and make sure of him with a bullet in the chest. I 

 will here say that I consider there is no danger in 

 creeping right up to a single elephant, though I do 

 not think it advisable to approach within thirty yards 

 or so of a large herd, as it often happens that in 

 their first panic, they do not know exactly where the 

 shot was fired, and come rushing down in a mass 

 right on to the spot where the hunter stands, making 

 it difficult for him to get out of the way. On this 

 occasion, keeping the thickly-foliaged bush on which 

 he was feeding between me and him, I crept round 

 the side of it, and was then so near to him that he 

 could almost have touched me had he stretched out 

 his trunk, when I saw, that, whereas one of his tusks 



