34 ADVENTURES OF AN ELEPHANT HUNTER ch. 
and hind legs, my left foot actually touching the 
toes of his left hind foot. From that unenviable 
position, still in full possession of every faculty and 
keenly alive to every move of the game, I saw 
him tremulously moving his trunk about, to right, to 
left, above and below, probably considering what his 
next move was to be. At this moment, the 
question flashed through my mind, how will he 
finish me off? And with irrelevant curiosity, I 
glanced up to see where my bullet had struck him. 
I experienced no fear of death, I was not conscious 
of any panorama of my life passing swiftly over my 
mind; all excitement had vanished and my heart 
was not even beating wildly. I was simply solilo¬ 
quizing : ‘In which way is he going to kill me? 
Will he kneel on and trample me horribly? Will 
he drive his tusk right through my body, or will he, 
by some heaven-sent chance, leave me alone ? 
Whichever way it is, may it be swiftly over and 
done with ! ’ While these thoughts were passing 
with peculiar calmness and lucidity through my 
brain, the elephant deliberately turned round, 
caught me by the shoulder and flung me violently 
into the branches of a small tree some fourteen 
yards away, the impact at once knocking me sense¬ 
less. On regaining consciousness, a few minutes 
later, I found myself lying on the ground with 
Simba kneeling over me vigorously shaking me 
