THE MOUNTED ELEPHANT-HUNTER. 320 



headlong charge from several quarters at the snmo 

 moment, and we were, often so surrounded by small 

 detachments that it appeared doubtful which party 

 would bo obliged to quit the Held. The sound of 

 our voices, however, uniformly turned the scale, and 

 declared man the victor." 



lu a letter now in my possession to a brother- 

 sportsman in India, the gallant captain further says : 

 " I have seen as many as three hundred elephants 

 in a, grouf), and a single ball in the forehead,* as 

 they pass in review order within thirty paces, does 

 the business It is usual to ' yah' the ele- 

 phant that is, ride with him before firing; but 

 after a little crammiug, they become bewildered and 

 ' gobiah,' and stand about in groups and clumps 

 within twenty-five yards. I was always fancying I 

 was peppering away at my old favourite Mowlah " 

 the elephant, I may remark parenthetically, from 

 whose back the captain, as he elsewhere informs us, 

 had, in India, slain great numbers both of lions and 

 tigers. 



What Captain Harris tells us as to the facility 

 with which a well-mounted man, in a country 

 tolerably free from timber, may approach and cir- 

 cumvent the elephant, would seem to be fully borno 

 out by the experiences of Gordon Gumming, who, 

 in his interesting work, says : 



" On the 27th of August, we came upon a largo 

 extent of burning grass, which the Bakalahari kindle 



* Surely the Captain menus the temple, where a bullet usually 

 proves fatal, and not the forehead, where, as regards the African 

 eleuhant, as we have said, it rarelv kills? 



