12 FOX-HOUND, FOREST, AND PRAIRIE. 



For some days we worked hard after the buffalo ; but 

 though we burnt a large tract of grass (the only plain we saw 

 in the country), and watched night and morning by its edges 

 three or four days after, in hopes of catching the buffalo coming 

 out to feed on the new grass, which in that climate springs up 

 almost in a night, we did not get a shot. Certainly their 

 tracks were plentiful in the jungle, but they are very shy 

 brutes, and difficult to find. 



On Saturday, Sept. 23rd, I had a very hard fight by myself. 

 We had been out for some hours during the morning without 

 success, and made up our minds to a blank week ; we even 

 thought of going back immediately to the mouth of the river, 

 where we had seen most signs of elephants. In the evening I 

 took my shot-gun with me along the edge of the burnt plain, 

 in hopes of killing a few pigeons, accompanied by Houssan 

 (my gun-bearer) with the 10-rifle and a few bullets, in case we 

 should come across anything big, which I thought a most un- 

 likely contingency, after the way we had worked every yard of 

 the ground about. 



After walking a mile or two and sitting down for a time, I 

 turned back along the edge of the forest, having had one shot 

 and killed an immense crane which got up close to me, when, 

 coming suddenly round a corner, I found myself face to face 

 with an elephant. He was standing feeding about fifty yards 

 from me, in a kind of swampy creek, fifteen or twenty yards 

 across, which bordered the edge of the jungle. I turned directly 

 to exchange my gun for my rifle, but before I could get it from 

 Houssan, who was some ten yards behind, the elephant had 

 caught sight of me, and was retreating into the wood. I ran 

 forward a few yards, and blazed both barrels at his ear. He 

 was evidently struck, and, reaching the jungle, faced about, 

 more than half inclined to charge. Fortunately he thought 

 about it long enough to give me time to load, and by the time 

 I had finished he had moved along some distance just inside 

 the trees. I then ran back round the corner the way I had 

 come, and met him just as he was leaving the forest. Not 



