Elephants 



Hunting in the thick forest is of course difficult and 

 dangerous work, but with ordinary precautions, steady nerves 

 and a heavy rifle, not more so than elsewhere. As heat and 

 thirst are scarcely to be reckoned with in the shade of the 

 forest, and there being always the possibility of bagging 

 rare animals such as the okapi and the bongo, the district 

 has much to recommend it. Then again the northern 

 extension of the forest is the haunt of a race of pigmy 

 elephants of possibly greater interest than those to be found 

 near Lake Leopold II or in the swamps of the French 

 Congo. 



Referring to these dwarf elephants, puts me in mind of 

 the so-called " bamboo " elephants to be found in the forests 

 of the Kivu volcanic region farther to the south. They would 

 appear to be an intermediate race between the large East 

 African species and the pigmy one. From one specimen that 

 I saw in the Bugoie Forest, although comparatively small 

 for what was, without doubt, an adult male, there was little 

 to distinguish it otherwise from an undcrgrown ordinary 

 elephant excepting its tusks. These were remarkable, in 

 that they wfere thin and finely pointed like those of a 

 female and of a perceptibly pinky-red colour. This ob- 

 servation proved to be correct, for later on when visiting 

 Kisenji Monsieur Verhulst showed me a pair of tusks 

 from the same forest, coloured in this fashion, and of 

 the same thin, straight shape. Their bright colouring is 

 at once discernible by the most casual observer. These 

 again, I was assured, were those of a fully grown 

 male. Their weight was, if I remember rightly, about 

 fifteen pounds. 



Mention has been made in a previous chapter of the very 



225 Q 



