ELEPHANTS AND RHINOCEROS 47 



the time we got back we found the big beast dead, and as the 

 young one had also been hit, we had to kill it. 



On the 9th we started at daybreak, going along the banks 

 of a stream, and soon hit off a trail, Macdonald leading, and 

 I keeping a little on one side, ready to pour in a volley if 

 required. In about an hour we came upon a fine male. 

 Macdonald fired and hit, but he ran into grass about 20 

 feet high, and into this we followed, but there were so many 

 tracks in every direction that we soon lost the one we had 

 been following. We still continued our course, and presently 

 came to a patch of unusually high and dense grass into which 

 Maina refused to enter, and mine hung back too. So we 

 knew there was something ahead of us. We told Maina's 

 mahout to push his beast in, but he declared it would not go 

 in, so Sookur called out : " Get out of the way : it is you who 

 are afraid, not the elephant ! " Giving Lutchmie a few vigor- 

 ous prods he drove her headlong into the entangled thicket. 

 I looked about everywhere, and had perhaps gone through 

 half the patch without seeing anything, when something 

 induced me to look back, and there within ten yards of me 

 stood a full-grown rhinoceros, craning its neck and staring 

 up at me in a peculiarly idiotic manner ; a lucky shot dropped 

 her dead, and then we discovered that there was a young one 

 with her : so leaving the carcase and the butcha undisturbed, 

 we sent an elephant back to the village for nets and men to 

 catch the calf, and went on ourselves. It was, as I have said, 

 a boisterous day, and a nasty drizzling rain set in ; the grass 

 was so blown about that to track any animal was useless, so 

 we were thinking of returning to camp when we came upon 

 two very fresh spoors. We could not resist following them for 

 awhile, Macdonald still leading. We had to go further than 

 we thought, and again came upon very heavy grass. Maina 

 suddenly turned off to the left and went off full score. I 

 called out, " Where are you going ? that is not the way the 

 rhinoceros have gone." But I got no reply, and the elephant 

 and his rider vanished. Sookur, after abusing Maina's mahout, 

 went straight on, and within a hundred yards I came upon two 

 full-grown rhinoceros. I could see their ears and indistinct 

 forms, looking towards me, so guessing for the chest of the 



