1 8 Great and Small Game of Africa 



retreats. The favourite fastness is a dense, but shadeless scrub, little or no 

 taller than themselves ; in the mountains, and sometimes by the rivers, 

 leafy— with a profusion of small, rough, rasping leaves— elsewhere parched, 

 thorny, full of briars and spiky plants ; but ever thick, monotonous, 

 burning, almost impenetrable. Or the cover may be of giant grass, almost 

 more solid and opaque than the scrub. 



In such places you may hear the elephants, you may smell them ; but, 

 unless you approach within a few yards, you are not likely to see them. 

 Even then, when, by dint of perseverance, careful exertion, and keen 

 observance of every caution, you have arrived almost without arm's reach, 

 perchance only a huge forehead, a colossal foot, or a great waving ear may 

 be visible. 



These covers are scattered, sometimes at widely -separated intervals, 

 through the country, from close to the coast (as in the neighbourhood of 

 the lower Sabaki and Tana rivers) inland. No herd is, however, confined 

 to any one neighbourhood ; but varies its feeding grounds, traversing wide 

 intervening tracts — generally by night as far as possible — when moving 

 from one locality to another, either in search of food, water, or on account 

 of being disturbed, or from mere caprice. Well- beaten paths generally 

 connect these different resorts ; in fact, so continuously are they linked in 

 this way, that it is impossible to say where the limit of any particular 

 herd's range may be. Climatic conditions have much to do with their 

 movements. During long periods of drought the elephants repair to the 

 mountains, where rain is more frequent, and water always abundant ; while 

 the wet season lasts, they wander over the drier and more open country, 

 which is shunned at other times. But the most favourable localities 

 are generally in the neighbourhood of high mountains, or near large rivers 

 or lakes. 



The herds are sometimes very large, as many as two or three hundred 

 being occasionally found together, though such herds often break up into 



