We now followed with great care the banks of the river about ten or fifteen yards inside of them, until at last the water became so deep that we came to a halt. How sorry we felt! I would have given much if I could have come near the elephants; but as we approached the banks we saw the elephants leaving the river. What monsters they seemed! I shouldered my long-range rifle, aimed at the big male, with but little hope of killing it, as I must have been several hundred yards off. I fired, heard the bullet strike one of the tusks, when the animals plunged into the forest, breaking down every thing before them. [Illustration: [Fleuron]] [Illustration: [Fleuron]] CHAPTER XVIII. NJALI-COUDIÉ.—AN AFRICAN TOWN.—THE CHIEF.—COURTSHIP AND MARRIAGE IN AFRICA.—BUYING A WIFE.—QUARREL OVER THE SPOILS. Now, after many wanderings, I find myself in the very large village of Bakalai called Njali-Coudié. Often I wonder that I have not been murdered by these Bakalai, for they are very treacherous, and life seems to them to be of no value. The village of Njali-Coudié is situated in the very hilly country between the Ofoubou and Ovenga Rivers. It was one of the largest Bakalai villages I had ever seen. The people were wild; their houses were small, very small indeed, and built with the bark of trees. It was surrounded by large plantain groves and clusters of sugar-cane. The name of the chief of that strange village was Mbango, and a fine savage he was. His hair and his beard were white. Round his waist was a piece of grass-cloth; by his side hung a tremendous war-knife; and on each of his ankles he wore two tremendous iron rings. Round his neck he wore some _monda_ fetich, which he thought could protect him from evil spirits and from being bewitched. Round him hung some charmed powder, preserved in the skin of a wild animal. Around his chest he wore a strip of leopard’s skin, which his people believed could never be pierced by spears or arrows. So we might say that King Mbango thought himself invulnerable.