CHAP. XXIII. 
THE ELEPHANT-HUNT. 
237 
one of the 6 bulls ’ close to us, which made him and the 
rest turn and go back over the open in the direction of 
the great forest, the dogs which had joined us following 
them up, and barking, or speaking, as a fox-hunter 
would call it in England, like a pack of hounds. 
The hunters were very much excited, exclaiming 
that the elephant was wounded, and that the dogs 
would never leave him. So off we started as fast as we 
could in pursuit, and it was after we had got out of 
the forest and into what we thought to be ( open’ that 
we found our difficulty. This scrub and tangled vegeta¬ 
tion was in most parts up to a man’s neck, and unless in 
the elephant-tracks there was no getting through it at all. 
However, His Royal Highness had got into one of these 
tracks or paths, was outstripping us all, and would most 
likely have rushed right on to the elephants and been 
killed, had I not put my best leg foremost and ran 
on and caught him by the belt, until Currie and others 
came up. 
It is well that we had foreseen the danger, for all 
at once as we approached the great forest there were 
all the elephants at the very edge of it, wheeled about 
and showing fight to the dogs. Towards the edge of 
the forest the scrub-bush got higher and higher, and 
when we had approached to within about eighty yards 
of the elephants one cow-elephant charged the dogs, 
which came running back on us, followed by the 
