We sight a rogue--A sudden onslaught--A wild elephant's attack--Shooting under difficulties--Stopping a rush--Repeated attacks--An invulnerable foe--Darkness stops the pursuit--A council of war--Picking up the trail--A _muckna_--A female elephant--Photographing a lady--A good sitter--A stampede--A gallant Rajput--Attacking on foot--A hazardous feat--A narrow escape--Final charge--A bivouac in the forest--Dangers of the night--A long chase--Planter hospitality--Another stampede--A career of crime--Eternal hope--A king-cobra--Abandoning the pursuit--An unrepentant villain--In the moment of danger. Khartoum stepped along at her usual deliberate pace through the jungle, occasionally raising her trunk to sweep the leaves off a branch and cram them into her mouth, or plucking a tuft of long grass to brush away the troublesome flies. On her neck the _mahout_ swayed to the motion, while I sat nursing my heavy ·470 cordite rifle and talking to my orderly, Draj Khan, seated behind me on the pad. He carried a ·303 carbine. We were passing through a patch of thin forest bare of undergrowth, when Bechan pulled up suddenly and whispered: "_Jungli hathi!_ (A wild elephant)." About sixty yards ahead a large tusker was standing apparently half asleep under the trees, its right side towards us. I wondered if, since it was alone, I could consider it an outlaw which it would be justifiable to shoot. The probabilities were, as there were no signs of a herd in the vicinity, that it was a rogue. While I was mentally debating the question I slipped a couple of solid cartridges into my rifle. As I did so the elephant turned its head slowly and I saw that it had only one tusk. "_Sahib! Sahib! wuh budmash hai!_ (It is the rogue!") whispered Bechan excitedly. At that moment it caught sight of us. Without hesitation, it turned and charged straight at us. There was no doubt now of its being a rogue; and probably it was Jhansi's assailant and the murderer of the Gurkha. I wished to wait until it was near enough for me to make sure of a fatal head-shot; but Khartoum became alarmed and tried to bolt. The _mahout_ did his best to stop her. "Shoot, Sahib, shoot! My elephant will not stand," he cried, beating her savagely with the iron _ankus_. So, as I could not get a shot at the head as the animal came through the trees at us, I fired at its shoulder in the hope of laming it and bringing it to a stand, so that I could finish it at close quarters. But it did not seem to feel the bullet and never checked in its stride. I was being favoured with a spectacle which it is not given to many sportsmen in India to witness. Sanderson says of it that