WITH THE BIG-GAME HUNTERS good shot is just back of the flap of the ear, and a third is in a place on one side of the tail so that the ball will run along the spine and enter the lungs. Large bullets and heavy guns are used. When the animal is close it is exceedingly dangerous to shoot and not kill. When injured the elephant is very revengeful. He will throw his trunk into the air, scream, hiss, and snort and rush after the hunter, knocking him down with a blow of his trunk and charging upon him with his great tusks. If the man falls, the huge beast is liable to kneel upon him and mash him to a jelly.

One of the difficulties of hunting elephants is the fact that it is not easy to distinguish them in the woods, as they are of much the same colour as the trees. A trav¬ eller here tells me that he once almost walked into a big elephant while going through the forest. He was stooping down and looking straight before him when he saw the beast’s legs and took them for tree trunks.

The average elephants of this region can easily make six miles an hour while on the march. They usually travel in herds, young and old moving along together. Notwithstanding their enormous weight, the animals can swim well, and can cross the largest rivers without any trouble.

Most of those which used to overrun these plains have been driven away and must now be hunted in the woods; but there are plenty in the forests between here and Uganda, and about the slopes of Mt. Kenya and Mt. Kilimanjaro. There are also many in the south near the Zambezi, and west of Lake Tanganyika, in the forests along the Congo. Some years ago they were being killed off at such a rapid rate, and the ivory output was de-273