THE MOUNTED ELEPHANT-HUNTER. 
329 
headlong charge from several quarters at the same 
moment,^and we were often so surrounded by small 
detachments that it appeared doubtful which party 
would be obliged to quit the field. The sound of 
our voices, however, uniformly turned the scale, and 
declared man the victor.” 
In a letter—now in my possession—to a brother- 
sportsman in India, the gallant captain further says : 
“ I have seen as many as three hundred elephants 
in a group, and a single ball in the forehead,* as 
they pass in review order within thirty paces, does 
the busiuess.It is usual to e yalT the ele¬ 
phant—that is, ride with him before firing; but 
after a little crammiug, they become bewildered and 
c gobiah, 5 and stand about in groups and clumps 
within twenty-five yards. I was always fancying I 
was peppering away at my old favourite Mowlah ”—• 
the elephant, I may remark parenthetically, from 
whose back the captain, as he elsewhere informs us, 
had, in India, slain great numbers both of lions and 
tigers. 
What Captain Harris tells us as to the facility 
with which a well-mounted man, in a country 
tolerably free from timber, may approach and cir¬ 
cumvent the elephant, would seem to be fully borne 
out by the experiences of Gordon Gumming, who, 
in his interesting work, says :— ’ 
“ On the 27th of August, we came upon a large 
extent of burning grass, which the Bakalahari kindle 
* Surely the Captain means the temple, where a bullet usually 
proves fatal, and not the forehead , where, as regards the African 
elephant, as we have said, it rarely kills ? 
