CHAPTER X 



ELEPHANT HUNTING NOT AN OCCASION FOR LIGHT- 

 SOME MERRYMAKING. FIVE HUNDRED THOU- 

 SAND ACRES OF FOREST IN WHICH THE 

 KENIA ELEPHANT LIVES, WANDERS 

 AND BRINGS UP HIS CHILDREN 



THE peril and excitement of elephant hunting can 

 not be realized by any one who has known only the 

 big, placid elephants of the circus, or fed peanuts 

 to a gentle-eyed pachyderm in the park. To the 

 person thus circumscribed in his outlook, the idea 

 of killing an elephant and calling it sport is little 

 short of criminal. It would seem like going out 

 in the barnyard and slaying a friendly old family 

 horse. 



That was my point of view before I went to 

 Africa, but later experiences caused the point of 

 view to shift considerably. If any one thinks that 

 elephant hunting is an occasion for lightsome mer- 

 rymaking he had better not meet the African ele- 

 phant in the rough. Most people are acquainted 

 with only the Indian elephant, the kind commonly 

 seen in captivity, and judge from him that the ele- 

 phant is a sort of semi-domesticated beast of bur- 

 den, like the camel and the ox. Yet the Indian 



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