CH. x] KEHTVTTT'S ELEPHANT 255 



days ill preserving tiie skin, which I afterward gave to 

 tlie University of California ; and I was too much 

 |>leased w^ith our luck to feel inclined to grunihle. We 

 were back in camp five hours after leaving it. Our 

 gun-bearers usually felt it incumbent on them to keep 

 a dignified bearing while in our company. But the 

 death of an elephant is always a great event ; and one 

 of the gun-bearers as they walked ahead of us camp- 

 ward soon began to improvise a song, reciting the 

 success of the hunt, the death of the elephant, and the 

 power of the rifies ; and gradually, as they got farther 

 ahead, the more light-hearted among them began to 

 give way to their spirits, and they came into camp 

 frolicking, gambolling, and dancing as if they w^ere still 

 the naked savages that they had been before they 

 became the white man's followers. 



Two days later Ivermit got his bull. He and Tarlton 

 had camped about ten miles off in a magnificent forest, 

 and late the first afternoon received news that a herd of 

 elephants was in the neighbourhood. They w^ere off* by 

 dawn, and in a few hours came on the herd. It con- 

 sisted chiefiy of cows and calves, but there was one big- 

 master bull, with fair tusks. It was open forest with 

 long grass. By careful stalking they got within thirty 

 yards of the bull, behind whom w^as a line of cows. 

 Kermit put both barrels of his heavy double "405 into 

 the tusker's head, but w^ithout even staggering him ; 

 and as he walked off" Tarlton also fired both barrels into 

 him, with no more effect ; then, as he slowly turned, 

 Kermit killed him with a shot in the brain from the 

 •405 AVinchester. Immediately the cows lifted their 

 ears, and began trmnpeting and threatening. If they 

 had come on in a body at that distance, there was not 

 much chance of turning them or of escaping from them : 



