Tracking was very difficult. As there was a total absence of rain, it was next to impossible to distinguish the tracks of two days' date from those most recent upon the hard and parched soil. The only positive clew was the fresh dung of the elephants, and this being deposited at long intervals rendered the search extremely tedious. The greater part of the day passed in useless toil, and, after fording the river backward and forward several times, we at length arrived at a large area of sand in the bend of the stream, that was evidently overflowed when the river was full. This surface of many acres was backed by a forest of large trees. Upon arrival at this spot the aggageers, who appeared to know every inch of the country, declared that, unless the elephants had gone far away, they must be close at hand, within the forest. We were speculating upon the direction of the wind, when we were surprised by the sudden trumpeting of an elephant, that proceeded from the forest already declared to be the covert of the herd. In a few minutes later a fine bull elephant marched majestically from the jungle upon the large area of sand, and proudly stalked direct toward the river. At that time we were stationed under cover of a high bank of sand that had been left by the retiring river in sweeping round an angle. We immediately dismounted, and remained well concealed. The question of attack was quickly settled. The elephant was quietly stalking toward the water, which was about three hundred paces distant from the jungle. This intervening space was heavy dry sand, that had been thrown up by the stream in the sudden bend of the river, which, turning from this point at a right angle, swept beneath a perpendicular cliff of conglomerate rock formed of rounded pebbles cemented together. I proposed that we should endeavor to stalk the elephant, by creeping along the edge of the river, under cover of a sand-bank about three feet high, and that, should the rifles fail, the aggageers should come on at full gallop and cut off his retreat from the jungle; we should then have a chance for the swords.