XVI BIG GAME AND BIG GAME HUNTING 163 
and ungainly creature, he is by no means so awk¬ 
ward as his size might lead one to believe. For a 
short distance, he can run at a great pace, while 
jumping ditches is for him a matter of comparative 
ease. In short, his strength is in proportion to his 
bulk, and he is admirably adapted to the nature of 
the country in which he lives. 
With regard to the risk attendant on hunting 
various kinds of big game, (a subject on which 
many famous hunters hold very diverse views,) all 
my experience tends to confirm me in the opinion 
that the pursuit of the elephant is, without doubt, the 
most dangerous. Second, and on a par, I would 
classify buffaloes and lions; third, leopards. In 
comparison with these, very little risk attaches to 
the hunting of the rhinoceros. However, in any 
such classification, so much depends on the manner 
of hunting ; for it is obvious that to hunt alone, with 
one or two natives as trackers, is accompanied by 
considerably more danger, than to form one of a 
party armed to the teeth with powerful modern 
rifles. And when an old hunter chances, in his 
reading, to come across an account of three white 
men all helping each other to kill one poor lion, he 
feels his gorge rise and, after making every possible 
allowance for the state of modern civilized nerves, is 
disgusted to think that such a wretched farce should 
masquerade under the name of sport. Nor can that 
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