Page:Hunting and trapping stories; a book for boys (IA huntingtrappings00pric).pdf/35

HUNTING AND CATCHING WILD ELEPHANTS opportunity to see a hunt conducted on foot, where the natives tried to sneak upon their game. It is almost comical to see a huge elephant rush away in panic from a couple of yelling, naked savages. It seems easier to hunt the elephants on horseback than on foot, but in the latter fashion the hunter is really much safer, for he can turn and dodge and take advantage of cover more quickly than when on horseback. More than one hunter has lost his life through his horse obeying the rein just a second too late.

Some of the African tribes kill the elephant in an ingenious manner. They find a pathway leading to some drinking pool where the elephant come down at night. They dig a pit deep enough to prevent the elephant from scrambling out once it has tumbled in. At the bottom of the pit they place an upright, sharpened, wooden stake, smeared with poison. The mouth of the pit is then covered over with branches, and earth is thrown on top ; the whole made to look as much like solid ground as possible. This scheme appears to be very simple, but it reality it is not. The elephant is wonderfully clever at detecting false ground, and if it suspects there is anything wrong it immediately stops and carefully feels around on all sides. If it finds a pit it drags the entire covering off, so that all of its fellows are warned. Moreover, the elephants will forsake that path forever. This has been proven over and over again. The elephant's sense of finding rotten or unsafe ground is all the more wonderful when it is remembered that they do most of their travelling in the night. It is a well known fact that the elephants cannot be induced to cross a bridge that is too weak too support their weight, and no amount of flogging will make them move a foot.

Another point which makes elephant pits objectionable is that it takes many natives, several days to construct one, and if the elephant finds out