298 
THE ELEPHANT. 
when wounded and hotly pursued, will hide himself 
behind a tree, and when his unwary pursuer has 
approached sufficiently near, he will push down the 
tree with his proboscis, with the object of causing 
the man’s destruction. 
Amral, the chief of the Namaqua Hottentots, 
told Mr. Galton and myself cc that on one occa¬ 
sion he and others were in pursuit of a troop of 
elephants, and at length came to a waggon-track 
which the animals had crossed. Here the latter, as 
was seen by their spoor, had come to a halt, and, 
after carefully examining the ground with their 
trunks, had formed a circle, in the centre of which 
the leader had taken up his position. Afterwards, 
individuals were sent forth to make further investi¬ 
gations. The Raced, or debate,” the chieftain 
went on to say, “ must have been long and weighty, 
for they (the elephants) had written much on the 
ground with their probosces. The result of the 
council was that to remain longer in the locality 
would be dangerous, and they therefore came to 
the unanimous resolution to decamp forthwith. 
Our attempts to overtake the creatures,” Amral 
went on to say, €C were useless, for, though we fol¬ 
lowed their tracks until sunset, we saw no more of 
them.” 
The tribe in question, I may add, believe “ that 
if a person shoots at an elephant and fails to kill 
him, the animal will immediately make for the am¬ 
bush, and, should he be unable to catch the enemy, 
will forthwith destroy all he has left behind him. 
Not content with this revenge, he will follow, in like 
