ELEPHANT 193 



traded or hidden in this way. A man paying 50 for a 

 licence to kill two elephant, and who goes after them, 

 hoping not only to cover his expenses but to make money, 

 cannot afford to pay the fine imposed for shooting under- 

 sized tusks, nor can he be contented with small ivory. 

 The temptation in his case is very great therefore, to leave 

 elephants he has killed, if they are small, and go on shoot- 

 ing till he has secured animals that pay him. 



The elephant herds are comparatively few and small, 

 their range comparatively restricted, and there is good reason 

 for preserving them. In Uganda the case is very different. 

 There elephant still are found in immense numbers, and 

 there they do, in a cultivated country, very great damage. 

 The natives are not permitted to shoot or trap them, but 

 there is no penalty for trading in ivory, as there is here. 

 Such regulations have created an anomalous condition. 

 The honest native protests against the wholesale ruin brought 

 on his shamba, by beasts he is not permitted to kill, while 

 the very officers who rule the country may, if they choose, 

 and sometimes they do choose, trade to their profit in ivory. 

 The Swahili traders go everywhere trying to buy tusks, 

 and carry evil and disease with them wherever they go. 

 Surely the whole situation needs reviewing and rearranging. 

 The two governments should act together. Here, where 

 I have been travelling, on the Uganda border, there is no 

 semblance of control on such a traffic. Any number of 

 tusks killed thereabouts could with utmost ease be taken 

 over the long, imaginary frontier line, and no man but the 

 unscrupulous trader be the wiser for it. 



Something must be done in Uganda, for the herds are 

 on the increase and the damage they do is great. White men, 

 if they are not professional hunters, will not, in large numbers 

 face the risks of the climate, so long as elephants, even 

 smaller ones, can be secured in the healthy uplands of 

 British East Africa. Professional hunters cannot possibly 



