THE EVIL EYE 85 certainly will require to do so at the conclusion of these perambulations. Thoughtfulness for others in this case is ironical ; too often it is much misplaced, for many a crop is all that stands between the life and semi-starvation of the unhappy owner.

A picture rises before me of a bizarre, naked figure in the grass of the river-side of the same district, violently bending and straightening his knees, and shaking his outstretched hands and arms, during the time my boat remained in sight. It was designed to ward off the " evil eye" which might be cast upon his crops, causing their destruction by disease or marauders.

Small wonder his concern ; that evening a bull elephant was wounded just before my arrival.

Night fell, and in the early morning we started on the trail, wading the black water of the khor. The numbers of the herd were very great, and a square mile of country was covered with fresh evidences of their presence. There were piles of steaming dung, some trees broken short off, others simply uprooted, but no elephant remained. The wounded one had no doubt been helped away, and the easy six-mile-an-hour saunter had taken them far inland before we appeared on the scene.

Here on the ground was a fragment of white ivory, broken from the tusk of some cow as she uplifted a tree-root. Almost invariably one tusk is used in preference, showing in consequence unequal wear ; and she would now be thrown on to the use of the imbroken one. In some cases the