21-8 THE TERRIBLE. 



An adventure of this sort with an elephant befel one 

 who has had more narrow escapes than any man living, 

 but whose modesty has always prevented him from pub- 

 lishing anything about himself. On the bnnks of the 

 Zouga, in 1 850, Mr Oswell pursued one of these animals 

 into the dense, thick, thorny bushes met with on the 

 margin of that river, and to which the elephant usually 

 flees for safety. He followed through a narrow pathway, 

 by lifting up some of the branches and forcing his way 

 through the rest ; but when he had just got over this 

 difficulty, he saw the elephant, whose tail he had got 

 glimpses of before, now rushing towards him. There was 

 then no time to lift up branches, so he tried to force the 

 horse through them. He could not effect a passage ; and, 

 as there was but an instant between the attempt and 

 failure, the hunter tried to dismount ; but, in doing this, 

 one foot was caught by a branch, and the spur drawn 

 along the animal's flank ; this made him spring away 

 and throw the rider on the ground, with his face to the 

 elephant, which being in full chase, still went on. Mr 

 Oswell saw the huge fore-foot ab )ut to descend on his 

 legs, parted them, and drew in his breath as if to resist 

 the pressure of the other foot, which he expected would 

 next descend on his body. He saw the whole length of 

 the under part of the enormous brute pass over him ; the 

 horse got away safely. Dr Livingstone, who records the 

 anecdote, has heard but of one other authentic instance 

 in which an elephant went over a man without injury; 

 and, for any one who knows the nature of the bush in 



