THE ELEPHANT, THE GIANT OF THE FOREST 



On they came ! Two big, young bulls, both with small 

 tusks but otherwise full-grown, led the charge, and when 

 within some twenty-five yards of me I raised the gun and 

 pulled the trigger. " Snap, snap ! " That was all that fol- 

 lowed, both cartridges failing to explode ! As I broke open 

 the gun as quickly as possible to put in two new shells, 

 backing at the same time to gain a fraction of a second's 

 time, I fell into a hole above my knees! Now the two 

 charging bulls were perhaps within fifteen yards or so, 

 and just as I raised the gun to fire again, a shot from the 

 gun bearer rang out to my left. The nearest bull, hit in 

 the shoulder by the powerful 1 1 millimeter Mauser, at once 

 turned and ran away sideways to my right, followed by 

 the others, all vanishing as quickly as they could, crush- 

 ing through the bush in their wild stampede! 



Not wanting to feel that my life had depended upon 

 my gun bearer's shot, I tried the big gun again, this time 

 aiming far above the fleeing monsters. Both shots went 

 off with a tremendous roar, which made the elephants 

 increase their speed still more. This showed to my satis- 

 faction that had my gun bearer not returned and shot 

 when he saw my plight, I could easily have killed both my 

 antagonists at a few yards' distance. Examining the un- 

 exploded shells afterwards, I found that they had been 

 carelessly loaded, although being bought from a reliable 

 London firm, the percussion caps having been pushed in 

 so far that the firing pin of the gun could not reach them. 



On the following day we found another very large 

 track of a single bull, which we with few interruptions fol- 

 lowed for five whole days under the most trying circum- 

 stances. We had to cross over marshes, rushing mountain 

 6 6i 



