he miss his aim, and he therefore preferred trusting to the chances of concealment. Presently the elephant faced about, and drew near the tree; but he again leaped over it without perceiving Le Vaillant, who, as soon as he retreated to a sufficient distance, sprang from his hiding-place, and shot him in the flank. Notwithstanding all this, he succeeded in effecting his escape, though his bloody traces too clearly showed the terrible condition to which their balls had reduced him. In this critical conjuncture, Klaas, his principal Hottentot, exhibited proofs of courage and affection which infinitely endeared him to his master, who thenceforward regarded him more in the light of a brother than a servant. To those who have all their lives been accustomed to live upon the flesh of the ox and the sheep, elephant cutlets may appear revolting; but in the deserts of Africa, where imperious hunger silences the objections of prejudice, and teaches man to regard the whole animal creation as his farmyard, the palate quickly accommodates itself to the viands within its reach, and even learns to discover delicacy in things which, in a fashionable dining-room, it might have loathed. However this may be, Le Vaillant and his Hottentots, whose appetites were grievously sharpened by fatigue, immediately employed themselves in cutting up and cooking their game. For the former, as the most dainty personage of the party, a few slices off the trunk were broiled, and he found them so exquisite that, being as I have already said, to a certain degree, an epicure, they gave him a taste for elephant hunting, which he afterward seized every occasion of indulging. But he was informed by Klaas that by far the greatest delicacy, which would cause him to forget the flavour of the trunk, was yet to come. This consisted of the elephant’s foot, which his people undertook to dress for his breakfast. The reader who has perused Captain Cook’s “Voyages in the South Seas,” or Ledyard, or the “Histoire Naturelle de l’Homme” of Lesson, will remember the description given by those navigators of the curious subterranean ovens employed by the native islanders in cooking. A large opening is made in the earth, which is filled with red-hot stones or charcoal, and upon these a great fire is kept up for several hours. The hole is then cleared, and the thing which is to be baked inserted in the centre. Then the top is again closed, and a blazing fire once more kindled; which, having burned during a great part of the night, is at length extinguished, when the oven is opened, and the meat taken out, more exquisitely cooked than any man accustomed to the ordinary culinary processes can conceive.