October 18, 1917 
LAINU & WATER 
13 
exclusivelv of watch-keeping: and ficld-davjs. jGning to sea is 
not the rapturously romantic existence many "pe6ple' imagine 
it to be if your are, as Tommy was, a junior in the red-hot 
engine-room of a ship that goes full speed to S6uth America 
for fruit, spends twelve hours loading in a port consisting of 
three sheds, a wireless station and a railway office, and then 
returns at full speed to England. Kipling's graphic picture 
jt youth ashore in tropic climes in " Macandrew's Prayer " : 
In port— we used no cargo steam— I'd dander doon the streets 
An idiot grinnin' in a dream, wi' shells an' parrakeets, ' 
An' walkin' sticks o' carved bamboo, an' blow-fish stuffed 
an' dried 
Filliu' me bunk wi' rubbishry the Chief put over side, 
's very pretty and very clever and no doubt very true of the 
jld eight-knot cargo-wallah of twenty-five years ago. But 
England does not get her bananas that way, let me tell you, 
md when I quoted these lines to Tommy, he smiled a rather 
:ynical smile. He had had five years of a very dift'erent 
jxperience. 
But I was going to tell you about what eventually hap- 
pened to him not long before coming out to us in Alexandria. 
After I left the Mitmho Jumbo Tommy went to the Lillie- 
bulero as Third. He had no certificate, because one of the 
delights of being in ships with many juniovs is that you cannot 
qualify for years. Progress for Tommy had been slow. 
Appearances, too, are against him, for he is very small, and no 
more resembles the marine engineer of fiction than you resemble 
the lady novelist of fiction. He does not use filthy language, 
he does not brain firemen with iron bars, nor does lie use a 
jargon that no man exi«pt Rudyard Kipling ever understood. 
He is a human being, which is why I am writing to you about 
him. And he went Third of the Lilliebulero which means he 
wears two stripes of gold lace on his sleeve, three-eighths wide, 
with three-eighths of purple-silk between. On watch he wears, 
like all the rest of us, a pair of cotton ducks and a cotton 
singlet. 
\\ ith her fyll cargo of fifty thousana nunches of bananas 
the I.iUiehiilefo was 'homeward bound, when three thousand 
miles from home, a singular thing happened. What was not 
singular was that it occurred on the Third's watch — twelve to 
four in the morning. Singular tilings were always happening 
on my own watcli when 1 was Third. This thing happened 
on the LiUiehulero at j.30 a.m., just as Tommy had gone into 
the stokehold to attend to the feed-checks. He was doing 
this, noting the water-level in the gauge-glasses, and seeing 
there was plenty of good large coal for cleaning fires at eight 
belfs when he heard a terrific uproar in the engine-room, a 
noise as though the main engines had broken loose from their 
foundations and were trying to kick their way out. 
Dashing in between the after-boilers he opened the double 
dust-proof 'door into the engine-room and was greeted with 
clouds of live steam, and the most appalling racket, in all 
probability, he had ever listened to. For the high-pressure 
engine had broken her cylinder bottom. And she was racing 
up and down and scattering destruction in all directions. 
The patent metallic packing, which is a round iron box full 
of spiing>and anti-friction blocks and plates and distance- 
pieces, had burst like a shrapnel shell and was sending frag- 
ments flying everywhere. 
Tommy rushed through the steam, which is very unpleasant 
in its own way, and found the throttle-handle. He got several 
pieces about the head and shoulders, but he got the throttle 
shut and the main engines were pulled up in twenty seconds 
after the smash. It was ten minutes before the other engineer 
could get down below and carry an unconscious and parboiled 
Tommy into fresh air. 
That is why I call him a very gallant young gentleman. 
Of course it was appreciated, for he saved tlie ship and cargo, 
and even shipowners are human beings, though to hear some 
newspaper talk you would imagine them to be incarnate 
fiends. It was very handsomely appreciated ; but he ought 
to have had the D.S.O. for all that. Don't vou think so ? 
The Place Where the Elephants Die 
By Owen Letcher 
Thin ix an incident of Hie Central African Campaign. 
W''E. found Strayne lying alongside the Mahenge 
pathway in a pool of his own blood. At first we 
did not recognise him, so blanched was his face. 
His beard had grown, his uniform was torn and 
ragged, and his legs were black with the ash of burnt grass. 
Altogether it was difficult to believe that this was Strayne, in 
peace-time a famous elephant Hunter, and in war the dapper 
Intelligence Officer of the Eastern Column. 
. It only required a moment's scrutiny to make it clear that 
Strayne was approaching the end of his last ' safari."* He 
had two ghastly wounds— one just above the heart and the 
other through his right thigh. They had evidently been made 
by the wicked it millimetre soft lead bullets used by the 
German Askari in the Central and East African campaigns. 
Death stared at us out of his eyes which see-med to burn 
like hot coals far away back in his head. But we did what 
we could for him. Tho column doctor was on the scene almost 
immediately and a machilla soon came doubling up from the 
rear. 
" Why, good God. it's Strayne ! " ejaculated the Adjutant 
and the Doctor together. 
" Wonder where he's been, " muttered the Adjutant. 
" Wonder what information he's got. It's ten days since he 
left us to try and find out what Brauermann's strength was." 
The Doctor looked up quickly from the well-nigh lifeless 
form that lay in the stretcher. " I don't think Strayne will 
ever make any more intelligence reports — not in this world, ' 
said he. 
Strayne died that evening, and perhaps because I am a 
sentimental soldier and not a warrior of business, he made a 
supreme effort and spoke a few words to me before he crossed 
the great divide. Then for the first time did I become aware 
of the existence of a Mrs. Strayni . We had all put Strayne 
down as a bachelor, although we had no real cause for doing' so. 
He was a man not given to talk ; in many ways he was a vast 
human mysterj'. 
" I want you — to see that my wife is looked after, 
Maudsley," he said with a tedious despair in his voice. " I 
fairly — worship her. I left hon^e for her sake — and — when- 
ever I've bagged a good Jumbo it's been halves partner with 
the tusks." 
The Doctor came silently into the hut but Strayne motioned 
him away, and 1 held up a finger and shook my head. "There's 
iomethirig I want to tell you, Maudsley," he continued, and 
* 'nnrnev. 
his voice died away almost to a whisper as the Doctor crept 
out of the hut. 
" Let's hear it, Strayne. I'll promise I'll do what I can." 
He gave me a look of great gratitude and weakly clasped 
my hand. \Mien he spoke again his voice was so faint that 
I had to bend closely over him to catch the whispered words. 
" I want you to sell nine thousand tusks of ivory for me 
and send the money home as soon as this show is over." 
" Nine thousand tusks ! " I ejaculated. " Why old thing 
it means a fortune,! " 
" About a quarter of a million I reckon," whispered Strayne. 
" It ought to set up my wife for the rest of her life." 
I was silent, for it had suddenly dawned on me that §trayne 
had probably taken leave of his senses. 
" Where are they ? " I asked with a view to humouring 
him. 
" It's the place where the elephants die," said Strayne. 
" The place where the elephants die ! " where had I heard 
that expression iDefore ? There was a curiously familiar ring 
about the words, but for the life of me I could not place them 
at the moment. 
" I went there once," said Strayne. " and had an exciting 
time of it. You'll have to be careful, but you can do it all 
right. God ! What a sight it is. It's only a few days from 
here, between the Mufinga and Musutu Ranges — down— in — a 
—deep — deep — valley — map in my — field — service note 
book." 
I tried to catch the rest, but the whisper subsided into a 
hushed gurgle, and a minute later Strayne died in my arms. 
We buried him the following defy beneath a great baobab 
tree, under the African foothills that he loved so well. The 
bugles blared out the impressive notes of the " Last Post," 
and then we tramped sorrowfully away. It seemed to me 
those clarion calls had awakened a thousand echoes in the 
grim old mountains, and as I wended iny way back to 
camp they kept repeating in my ears : " The place where 
the elephants die ! ',' " The place where the elephants die ! " 
Here was poor Strayne — a veritable elephant among men 
(he stood f) feet 4 in li's socks) dead — and with him perhaps 
his secret. But I had promised to do what I could. Then it 
all came suddenly back to me. 1 had heard those words : 
" The place where the elephants die " on two previous 
occasions. 
The first time was at Karonga before our advance began. 
I had heard them there, used by old Nicholson, who was a 
(|uaint old fossil of a trader -who had wandered all over 
Africa from Eernando Po to Chinde, and who had accumu- 
