LATER VISITS TO SOUTH AFRICA 139 



I broke a twig to attract his attention : his head swung half 

 round, but was so guarded by the bush that it would have been 

 useless to fire at it. His shoulder was more exposed. There 

 was no time to wait, he was on the move, and the dust flew 

 from his side as the heavy ball struck him. Screaming angrily, 

 he turned full front in the direction of the tree by which I stood 

 motionless. I do not think he made me out, and the bush 

 was too thick for me to risk giving him further information by 

 a second shot. For a moment we confronted one another : 

 and then, the rumbling note of alarm uttered by his companions 

 decided him on joining them, and the stiff thorns bent before 

 the weight of seven or eight bulls, as a cornfield in the wind. 



I regained the path and rode along the line of their retreat, 

 which, as shown by the yielding bush, was parallel to it. 

 After a time the thorns thinned out, and I caught sight of 

 the wounded elephant holding a course of his own a little 

 to the left of his fellows ; and when he entered the tropical 

 forest beyond I was in his wake, and very soon compelled 

 to follow where he broke away. Lying flat on my pony's neck 

 and guiding him as I best might by occasional glimpses of the 

 tail of my now slowly retreating pioneer, I laboured on in the 

 hope that more open ground might enable me to get up along- 

 side of him. A most unpleasant ride it was. My constrained 

 position gave me but little chance of using my hands to save 

 my head ; I was at one time nearly pulled from the saddle by 

 the heavy boughs, and at another nearly torn to pieces by the 

 wicked thorns of the ' wait-a-bit,' which, although no longer 

 the tree of the jungle, were intolerably scattered through it. I 

 have killed elephants on very bad ground, but this was the 

 worst piece of bush I ever rode into in my life. A little extra 

 noise from the pursuers caused the pursued to step ; and whilst 

 clinging like Gilpin to the calender's horse and peering at the 

 broad stern of the chase, I saw him suddenly put his head 

 where his tail ought to have been. The trunk was tightly 

 coiled an elephant nearly always coils his trunk in thick 

 bush for fear of pricking it forward flapped the huge ears, 



