48 ELEPHANT-HUNTING IN EAST AFRICA chap. 



It being now late, I thought it a suitable time to knock off, 

 so made tracks for camp. I afterwards regretted not having 

 gone on as long as there was any daylight ; as I heard (what I 

 did not know at the time) that a big bull, which I had been 

 told was in the herd but had not seen, was caught sight of by 

 a native with me just when I shot the last elephant. One 

 ought never to give up while there is a chance of scoring 

 another when hunting for ivory. Still I had not done so badly 

 for that day : though my teeth were not large they were nice 

 " kalashas," and a better average size than those I had got two 

 days before. My men, too, were very pleased and jubilant 

 that our luck had turned, and that we were at last really doing 

 some good work. To make elephant-hunting pay in Eastern 

 Equatorial Africa is no easy matter ; the expenses of an expedi- 

 tion are so heavy, owing to the enormous cost of transport and 

 the necessity of taking a large number of porters both for this 

 purpose and also for safety ; the distances, too, are so great, 

 and so much time is cut to waste in travelling and inevitable 

 delays from various causes. The uncertainty of animal trans- 

 port is sufficiently shown by the fact that I had only a single 

 survivor (and it afterwards died) left out of upwards of twenty 

 pack donkeys ! As to trade, nowhere I have yet reached is there 

 any profit to be made by a white man ; Swahili and Wakamba 

 traders have spoilt it. Moreover, ivory trading is a tedious, 

 pottering process, far better suited to the Sw^ahili than the 

 English temperament ; especially in a climate where activity 

 is (in my experience) the great essential in preserving good 

 health, while stagnation means fever. 



The next day we cut out the tusks. Of course the 

 elephants had cleared out. I tried to get information as to 

 where the herd had gone to, and word was brought that it had 

 gone down a stream that ran through the forest in which I 

 had found it, in the direction of the Gwaso Nyiro River ; so I 

 determined to go in search again on the morrow, notwith- 

 standing that my feet were still very sore and that I was 



