[6 THROUGH GASA LAND. 



annoying predicament, puzzling my brain over to 

 know what artifice I could employ to make the 

 elephant change his position, but without coming 

 to a satisfactory conclusion. During all this time 

 the animal had not moved an inch, except to raise 

 or lower his trunk, and exhibited no indication of 

 doing so. Would a whistle, I thought, accomplish 

 my purpose, and I was about to put this experiment 

 in practice, when the report of one of my friend's 

 guns echoed through the forest. In an instant my 

 beast slewed himself round, as if to ascertain from 

 where the strange noise had come, and he stood 

 broadside to me, motionless, listening with the 

 utmost intentness. Beween the eye and the base of 

 the ear is a slightly hollowed space, always looking 

 darker than the rest of the hide. For this I aimed 

 and pressed the trigger, and the poor beast, swaying 

 his trunk violently, simply sat down, like one of his 

 Indian broken-in brethren kneeling to take on a 

 load. The elephant was quite dead ; in fact, the 

 rapidity of hfs death, which I can only explain by 

 supposing the bullet entered the brain, I think 

 rather disappointed me. 



