Elephant 



now on the other, as what little wind there was 

 was dreadfully shifty at this hour of the morning. 

 There was still plenty of time to spare, and we 

 did not want to get too close to them until we 

 had "spotted" the two big customers. Then 

 we lost them. They suddenly disappeared alto- 

 gether, and we couldn't hear any sound in the 

 jungle, although we knew they must be some- 

 where quite close by. Now came the ticklish 

 time, as on account of the shifting wind I was 

 afraid of dashing at it and finding myself slap in 

 the middle of the whole boiling ; which is what 

 actually happened. They had spread out a bit, 

 and we went straight ahead, until suddenly we 

 found ourselves in the thick of them. But still 

 we could not catch a glimpse of either of the two 

 big bulls. It is quite a common thing, by the 

 way, for the old breeding bulls to separate from 

 the herd in the spring of the year, feeding very 

 often as far as one or two days' journey away 

 from them, accompanied by an old cow or two, 

 or else by a young bull, and rejoining the herd 

 after four or five days of this hermit -like 

 existence. 



I had begun to think the two bulls were a 

 myth, till, all of a sudden, one of my orderlies 

 pointed out one tremendous great fellow about 

 eighty yards ahead on the other side of a clearing. 

 I was at once taken charge of — one man seizing 

 me by the arm, the other pushing me in the 



in 



