320 THE WILDERNESS AND JUNGLE 



decrease in the number of elephants in parts 

 of Africa where white ivory hunters, of whom 

 the late A. H. Neumann was one of the last, 

 no longer operate. It is, in fact, the native 

 hunters who to-day supply the market with 

 nine-tenths of the ivory that changes hands at 

 the great sales. 



The massacre of elephants, cows as well as 

 bulls, has been conducted without restraint. 

 In India, where the shooting of elephants, other 

 than certified " rogues," has been forbidden 

 for the past thirty years, the animal has main- 

 tained its numbers, though Sanderson's pre- 

 diction that the prohibition would eventually 

 have to be removed has not so far been ful- 

 filled. Formerly, however, though so easily 

 tamed in the service of man, the Indian elephant 

 was destroyed as wantonly as the African in 

 our day, and Sir Victor Brooke alludes in 

 passing to the shooting of five in three hours 

 one morning before breakfast. The African 

 elephant, which is not protected to the same 

 extent, is in desperate straits. The greed for 

 ivory seems undiminished. One firm of cutlers 

 alone admitted, not many years ago, having 

 taken the tusks of between twelve and fifteen 

 hundred elephants every year, in addition to 

 which regular demand it kept no less than 

 eight tons of ivory in reserve. Neumann 

 bagged fourteen of these huge creatures, most 



