18 ANIMAL LIFE IN AFRICA 



so long existed, they could not have survived to the 

 extent they have done. For a long time after the natives 

 discovered its commercial value, the ivory which was 

 found all over Central Africa, as the result of natural 

 deaths, was sufficient for trading purposes ; but at the 

 present day this source has mostly become exhausted, 

 and the living animal alone remains to satisfy the demands 

 of barter. 



Omitting the wholesale destruction in South Africa 

 during the last century, which resulted in the virtual 

 extermination of the animals, within the last ten years 

 the numbers killed throughout the continent would, if 

 summed up, present a surprising total. A few instances 

 will suffice. In 1898 and 1899, two sportsmen are known 

 to have shot elephants producing four tons of ivory, 

 between Mobai and Bangue ; thirty-six tons were seen 

 in a store at Ibenge, collected between that place and 

 Yakoma, the local price being one franc per kilo ! About 

 the same time one sporting party paid 800 duty on 

 tusks of ivory killed or acquired near Lake Rudolf. The 

 destruction of female and immature animals was also 

 very serious, and, ' without doubt, much of the total 

 weight annually traded, was made up of their small tusks. 

 At the end of 1902, immature ivory was sold in German 

 East Africa to the value of 17,700 rupees, which corre- 

 sponded perhaps to the tusks of between 1300 and 1400 

 young elephants, collected during the two or three years 

 within which prohibitory legislation had been in force 

 (Herr Gotzen's report). No doubt before the killing 

 of such animals was forbidden, the numbers destroyed 

 were still greater. 



Since 1900, elephant -hunting has been everywhere 

 restricted by regulations, and the killing of females, and 

 of males carrying tusks under a certain weight, has been 



