316 AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 



of them. Two were feeding in bush which hid them from 

 view, and the third stood between, facing us. We could 

 only see the top of his head and back, and not his tusks, and 

 could not tell whether he was worth shooting. Much puz- 

 zled we stood where we were, peering anxiously at the huge 

 half-hidden game. Suddenly there was a slight eddy in 

 the wind, up went the elephant's trunk, twisting to and fro 

 in the air; evidently he could not catch a clear scent; but 

 in another moment we saw the three great dark forms 

 moving gently off through the bush. As rapidly as possi- 

 ble, following the trails already tramped by the elephants, 

 we walked forward, and after a hundred yards Tarlton 

 pointed to a big bull with good tusks standing motionless 

 behind some small trees seventy yards distant. As I aimed 

 at his head he started to move off; the first bullet from the 

 heavy Holland brought him to his knees, and as he rose I 

 knocked him flat with the second. He struggled to rise; 

 but, both firing, we kept him down; and I finished him 

 with a bullet in the brain from the little Springfield. Al- 

 though rather younger than either of the bulls I had already 

 shot, it was even larger. In its stomach were beans from 

 the shambas, abutilon tips, and bark, and especially the 

 twigs, leaves, and white blossoms of a smaller shrub. The 

 tusks weighed a little over a hundred pounds the pair. 



We still needed a cow for the museum; and a couple 

 of days later, at noon, a party of natives brought in word 

 that they had seen two cows in a spot five miles away. 

 Piloted by a naked spearman, whose hair was done into a 

 cue, we rode toward the place. For most of the distance 

 we followed old elephant trails, in some places mere tracks 

 beaten down through stiff grass which stood above the 

 head of a man on horseback, in other places paths rutted 

 deep into the earth. We crossed a river, where monkeys 

 chattered among the tree tops. On an open plain we saw 

 a rhinoceros cow trotting off with her calf. At last we came 

 to a hill-top with, on the summit, a noble fig-tree, whose 

 giant limbs were stretched over the palms that clustered 



