200 THE LAND OF THE LION 
crossed? They will wander aimlessly along its side, or 
gaze at its quagmire hopelessly. You must decide the 
line of country, you must select the crossing. Were they 
by themselves they can go ahead. If you are present, 
you must go ahead, or, if not, minutely direct them where 
to go. They are of course utterly ignorant of how to get 
a mule or an ass over. They know where they want to go; 
they know where the game is likely to be, and where its 
long, tortuous ramblings will probably end; and in these 
matters they are to you of inestimable value. The rest 
you must do for yourself. We found ourselves after a time 
in a country that certainly had every appearance of being 
the undisturbed home of many elephant bands. The 
broad tracks of herds, and the single ones of bulls, crossed 
and recrossed each other. The thorn trees had been much 
fed on. The high grass was trampled and eaten. Still we 
had come to no fresh sign for two days. 
One morning in early October, surely a red letter day, 
we broke camp very early and had ridden about three hours 
through a swampy country when, suddenly, without any 
warning, I heard a far-off, shrill note blown. It sounded 
more like the clear note of a high organ stop than anything 
else I can think of. H. had said to me, not five minutes 
before, “‘This is the first morning we have had in ten days 
that I should call a really good morning for elephant hunt- 
ing. The breeze is fine and steady.” 
Here at last were the elephant. Here in their own 
chosen home, not harried by Boer settler on the plateau 
or hunting sefari, but resting in their own land, under the 
shadow of the great mountain that had sheltered their 
herds for countless thousands of years. Here, safe from all 
harm, amid solitudes that had seldom echoed a rifle shot, 
it seemed like vandalism to enter. But the truth must 
be told —to be the first there but added to the zest of 
entrance, something of the barbarian charm of conquest. 
