CREATURES OF THE WILDERNESS 179 



elephant must have got slight wind of us, as 

 he twice faced in our direction, with ears 

 cocked and trunk extended, and finally moved 

 slowly off, fortunately up-wind. I had, in the 

 meantime, had ample opportunity of examining 

 him through my Zeiss glasses, and made him 

 out to be a bull of ordinary size with tusks of 

 apparently about 30 Ibs. each, but I could not 

 see whether the other two were in the forest 

 beyond. I concluded, however, that it was 

 best to follow him, on the assumption that, 

 even if they were not with him, he would 

 certainly be making his way to rejoin them, 

 and this luckily proved to be the case, for 

 when he had gone another mile he suddenly 

 halted in some fairly thick cover, in which I 

 was able to make out the tails and hind- 

 quarters of two others. 



" I now made the four natives with me go 

 back some distance and sit down, as I knew 

 none of them well enough to trust him with a 

 second rifle, and I preferred to advance alone, 

 carrying my double '400 cordite ejector, to- 

 wards the cover, which was straight up-wind. 

 As I proceeded, the elephants went slowly for- 

 ward, and on reaching the spot where they 

 had previously stood, I found that the thick 

 patch extended only some 50 yards farther, 

 and that beyond it lay an open patch of some 

 three or four acres. To my surprise I now 

 saw, standing in this, within about 40 yards 

 of the nearest trees, not three, but four ele- 

 phants, one of them much bigger than the 

 rest, and evidently the animal whose spoor I 



