340 
THE ELEPHANT. 
furnished with well-trained hunters, and thus has 
at command the easiest and surest means of en¬ 
joying his gun without the fatigues attendant on 
night-watching. During my peregrinations, how¬ 
ever, in South Africa, I have seen something of 
every sort of sport —whether at night, by the side 
of the water, or the u salt-lick,” or by day 
on foot, or on horseback, and I must conscien¬ 
tiously declare that, in my opinion, a moonlight am¬ 
bush by a pool frequented by numerous wild animals 
is worth all the other modes of enjoying a gun put 
together. In the first place, there is something 
mysterious and thrilling in finding oneself the secret 
and unsuspected spectator of the wild movements, 
habits, and propensities of the denizens of nature’s 
varied and wonderful menagerie; no high feeding, 
no prison-bars, no harsh and cruel keeper’s voice 
having yet enervated, damped, or destroyed the 
elasticity, buoyancy, and frolicsomeness of animal life. 
Then the intense excitement between each ex¬ 
pected arrival ; the distant footfall, now heard 
distinctly rattling over a rugged surface, now gently 
vibrating’ on the strained ear, as it treads over softer 
ground—it may be that of a small antelope or an 
elephant, of a wild boar or a rhinoceros, of a gnu 
or a giraffe, of a jackal or a lion. And what 
opportunities present themselves of observing the 
habits and peculiarities of each species, and even of 
individuals, to say nothing of the terrible battles 
that sometimes take place between animals when 
thus congregated, and which can so rarely be wit¬ 
nessed in the day-time. I have certainly learnt 
