Although the hunting of elephants is as a rule very hard and trying work, there is always the possibility of getting them without much trouble, as happened to myself one day in Turkwel, a district in the Suk country east of Mount Elgon. While the camp was being pitched a porter came up to say that when collecting firewood in the bush he had seen elephants close by, and had left them quietly feeding and standing about. Though it seemed very improbable that I should find them after all the noise that had been and still was going on amongst the men, I went out and found a herd of some twenty-five elephants, standing within 600 yards of camp. The country was undulating and very open, and as the grass had lately been burnt there was no covert excepting table-topped mimosa trees, while to make matters worse the elephants were much scattered and standing on the other side of a swampy hollow, with the exception of one bull, which was standing in it. With great difficulty I managed to crawl up to a fallen tree on the edge of the swamp, and within about 80 yards of where the bull was standing. Resting the 4-bore on the fallen tree, I took a steady shot at him as he was in the act of drinking, and gave him another bullet from the 8-bore far back in the ribs, which, as he turned, raked forward into his vitals. Running forward into the swamp, I gave a fine cow a good shot behind the shoulder with the left barrel, and again getting hold of the 4-bore gave another cow a shot, but too far back and low down, and before I could get through the swamp the herd went off. The bull after going less than 100 yards fell over dead, and another couple of shots finished the first cow; then followed a long chase after the other cow, which I finally got with a shot almost in the ear-hole, after giving her a great number of ineffectual body shots. [Illustration: Dead elephant] CHAPTER XI THE AFRICAN BUFFALO BY F. J. JACKSON