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AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 
boy in sheer wantonness, and had to be himself slain. In 
Uganda the buffalo were for years protected, and grew so 
bold, killed so many natives, and ruined so many villages, 
that they are now classed as vermin and their destruction 
in every way encouraged. In the very neighborhood where 
I was hunting at Kenia, but six weeks before my coming, 
a cow buffalo had wandered down into the plains and run 
amuck, had attacked two villages, had killed a man and a 
boy, and had then been mobbed to death by the spearmen. 
Elephant, when in numbers, and when not possessed of 
the fear of man, are more impossible neighbors than hippo, 
rhino, or buffalo; but they are so eagerly sought after by 
ivory hunters that it is only rarely that they get the chance 
to become really dangerous to life, although in many places 
their ravages among the crops are severely felt by the un¬ 
fortunate natives who live near them. 
The chase of the elephant, if persistently followed, en¬ 
tails more fatigue and hardship than any other kind of 
African hunting. As regards risk, it is hard to say whether 
it is more or less dangerous than the chase of the lion and 
the buffalo. Both Cuninghame and Tarlton, men of wide 
experience, ranked elephant hunting, in point of danger, 
as nearly on the level with lion hunting, and as more dan¬ 
gerous than buffalo hunting; and all three kinds as far 
more dangerous than the chase of the rhino. Personally, I 
believe the actual conflict with a lion, where the conditions 
are the same, to be normally the more dangerous sport; 
though far greater demands are made by elephant hunting 
on the qualities of personal endurance and hardihood and 
resolute perseverance in the face of disappointment and 
difficulty. Buffalo, seemingly, do not charge as freely as 
