THE ELEPHANT 57 



just on the inside of the forest, which here con- 

 sisted of stunted trees, on the edge of a wide open 

 space in the middle of which was a marshy bog 

 surrounded by high grass and rushes, a mere 

 muddy, stagnant, weed-covered pool. The moon, 

 I remember, was very near the full, and the calm 

 beauty of the African night shed a soothing 

 influence, heightened by the softening half-tones 

 of the clear moonlight. I must have been asleep 

 some time, for after a day's elephant spooring 

 one turns in early, when I became conscious of 

 an excited whisper at the doorway of my tent. 

 " Ngunya, Ngunya, etebo zinawa " (Sir, Sir, 

 the elephants are coming). To persons living 

 in Europe, the even current of whose lives is 

 seldom ruffled by events of more serious import 

 than a descent of poachers on a well-stocked 

 covert, or the nocturnal bursting of the bathroom 

 cistern, the intense excitement of so momentous 

 a communication, especially in the middle of the 

 night, may not be fully appreciable, but, ac- 

 companied as it was in this case by the weird, 

 romantic environment of the soft African night, 

 and the charm of the mysterious forest, he would 

 have been a laggard, indeed, who did not leap from 

 his bed and, in nothing more than pyjamas and 

 foot-wear, seize a brace of rifles and hurriedly seek 

 the open. For a few moments I perceived noth- 

 ing, as my servants and hunters, finger on lip, 

 faced towards the dusky forest listening intently. 

 Then there reached us a low, querulous whimper, 

 as of a female calling to her calf, and immediately 

 afterwards a swishing of leaves followed by the 



