“I thought they were found much larger than that,” said Margetts.
“Ah, so people say,” said Hardy. “They talk of their being fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen feet high, but that is all fancy. Matamo here, who has shot plenty of them, would tell you so. How high was the largest elephant you ever shot, Matamo?”
“The bull-elephants are mostly nine or ten feet,” said the Bechuana. “Some stand eleven feet, but not many. I once saw one eleven and a half feet high, but never bigger.”
“Just so,” said Hardy. “Well, this chap, I should think, might have been eleven and a half. He was, I fancy, what they call a rogue elephant—an elephant, that is to say, who has been sent to Coventry, for some offence, by his companions. They are always extremely dangerous, and will sometimes attack a man without provocation; which elephants, as an ordinary rule, will not do. He had the most magnificent tusks I ever saw; I suppose our commanding officer, Captain Sparrow, noticed this, and thought they would sell for a lot of money in Magdala. He gave the order for all of us to fire upon him, and kill him. I was aware of the danger, and ventured to step up to him, and ask him to recall his order. I knew how difficult the elephant is to kill, except to experienced hunters. It was before the days of the Martini-Henrys, you will remember. I suppose the captain thought that out of a hundred shots one must be mortal. The men fired before I could get his attention; and, I suppose, considering the size of the mark, every one must have hit him. He staggered under the shock, and his sides streamed with blood, but he did not fall.”
“No, Mr Hardy,” said Vander Heyden, smiling; “no more than a man would fall if he was pricked with a hundred needles. Well, what next?”
“The next thing was that he recovered his legs,” said Hardy, “and glared round at us with an angry eye, as much as to ask, who was to pay for this outrage? I was nearest to him, and I think he had seen me move out to Captain Sparrow, and had an idea that I might have been the author of the attack. Any way, I felt for a minute or two very uncomfortable; but, if he had suspected me, he changed his mind, and made a rush straight at Captain Sparrow. The captain ran for it, and dodged behind his men. It was no good. The elephant soon caught him with his trunk, whirled him into the air as if he had been a shuttlecock, and, when he came down again, trampled upon him again and again, till he had trodden all human likeness out of him. Then he looked round upon the ranks again, as much as to say, ‘That’s enough for this time, but you’d better not try this again.’ After which he turned quietly round and went into the bush. We dug a grave, and scraped together, as well as we could, the bloody and mangled remains. I shall never forget the look the elephant gave me. It was as much as to say, ‘If I thought you had anything to do with it, I’d give it to you too.’”
“Ha! that was a narrow escape, Mr Hardy,” said Moritz; “but I think my friend Henryk’s here was narrower still. I daresay he will tell it you himself.”
The others joining in the request, Vander Heyden complied willingly enough.
“It occurred some years ago,” he said. “I was staying at the time at Pretoria, with my relative Pieter Uys, and we had gone out for some bok-shooting in the wild country that runs up towards the Limpopo. It was generally believed that the wild beasts had left that neighbourhood; but I imagine that a hunt must have been going on somewhere near the Limpopo, and a number of elephants, some of them wounded, were making their way south. At all events, they broke upon us without our having had any suspicion of their being in our neighbourhood, bursting through the thick mimosas round us, as though they had been so many bulrushes. We were three in party—Frank, myself, and a Hottentot named Kololo. One of the largest of the herd came so suddenly upon us that we had no time to think of escaping. We did the only thing there was to do: we levelled our rifles and fired, hoping to strike him in the heart or brain. Kololo, poor fellow, aimed right enough; but the elephant tossed his head at the moment, and the ball struck his tusk and glanced off. The movement distracted my aim also, and my bullet only inflicted a flesh wound. Frank’s rifle, luckily for him, was at the moment empty. The elephant glared at us, then ran up and caught Kololo round the waist with his trunk and flung him up a great distance into the air, so that he fell among the Tambookie grass. Then he charged me, caught me, as he had Kololo, round the waist, and pitched me up as he had him, as easy as a boy shies a stone into the air. Fortunately for me, there was great motjeerie close at hand. I was thrown across one of the great branches, and was jammed into a fork of the tree, so tight that I could not release myself. The elephant stopped below and waited for me to fall, but, seeing that I did not, he rushed after Kololo, who was still lying half stunned in the Tambookie grass, and trampled him, very much as Mr Hardy describes, into powder. Then he came back to the tree where I was still lying insensible, and, seeing that I was out of his reach, twisted his trunk round the bole and tried to tear it up. Then he put his forehead against it and tried to push it down. Big as it was, it cracked under his enormous weight. But by this time Frank had reloaded his rifle, and got a clear sight of him, as he stood pushing at the tree. The ball passed through his heart, and he fell dead instantly. If Frank had taken a bad aim, I shouldn’t have been sitting here to tell the story.”
“Well, I think your escape was narrower than Hardy’s,” said Ernest Baylen. “Halloo, Willikind, what now?”