Elephant Slaughter. 23 



movements of the herd since the trackers left. One 

 tracker now leads the way, and they cautiously proceed. 

 The boughs are heard slightly rustling as the unconscious 

 elephants are fanning the flies from their bodies within 

 a hundred yards of the guns. 



The jungle is open and good, interspersed with plots 

 of rank grass ; and quietly following the head tracker, 

 into whose hands our friends have committed them- 

 selves, they follow like hounds under the control of a 

 huntsman. The tracker is a famous fellow, and he 

 brings up his employers in a masterly manner within 

 ten paces of the still unconscious elephants. He now 

 retreats quietly behind the guns, and the sport begins. 

 A cloud of smoke from a regular volley, a crash through 

 the splintering branches as the panic-stricken herd rush 

 from the scene of conflict, and it is all over. X. has 

 killed two, Y. has killed one and Z. knocked down 

 one, but he got up again and got away ; total, three 

 bagged. Our friends now return to the tent, and, after 

 perhaps a month of this kind of shooting, they arrive 

 at their original headquarters, having bagged perhaps 

 twenty elephants. They give their opinion upon 

 elephant-shooting, and declare it to be capital sport, 

 but there is no danger in it, as the elephants invariably 

 run away. 



Let us imagine ourselves in the position of the half- 

 asleep and unsuspecting herd. We are lying down in 

 a doze during the heat of the day, and our senses are 

 half benumbed by a sense of sleep. We are beneath 

 the shade of "a large tree, and we do not dream that 

 danger is near us. 



A frightful scream suddenly scatters our wandering 

 senses. It is a rogue elephant upon us ! It was the 



