he white feather
before the boys, so I assented with much outward readiness, and we
started, I on the second horse, and the others on foot. When we had
travelled for the best part of an hour down the valley, all of a sudden
we came upon the whole herd, which numbered a little more than eighty.
Just in front of them the bush was so thick that they seemed to hesitate
about entering it, and the sides of the valley were so rocky and steep
at this point that they could not climb them.

They saw us at the same moment as we saw them, and inwardly I was filled
with fears lest they should take it into their heads to charge back up
the gully. But they did not; trumpeting aloud, they rushed at the thick
bush which went down before them like corn before a sickle. I do not
think that in all my experiences I ever heard anything to equal the
sound they made as they crashed through and over the shrubs and trees.
Before them was a dense forest belt from a hundred to a hundred and
fifty feet in width. As they rushed on, it fell, so that behind them
was nothing but a level roadway strewed with fallen trunks, crushed
branches, and here and there a tree, too strong even for them, left
stranded amid the wreck. On they went, and, notwithstanding the nature
of the ground over which they had to travel, they kept their distance
ahead of us. This sort of thing continued for a mile or more, and then
I saw that in front of the elephants the valley opened into a space
covered with reeds and grass--it might have been five or six acres in
extent--beyond which the valley ran on again.

The herd reached the edge of this expanse, and for a moment pulled up,
hesitating--evidently they mistrusted it. My men yelled aloud, as only
Kaffirs can, and that settled them. Headed by the wounded bull, whose
martial ardour, like my own, was somewhat cooled, they spread out and
dashed into the treacherous swamp--for such it was, though just then
there was no water to be seen. For a few yards all went well with them,
though they clearly found it heavy going; then suddenly the great bull
sank up to his belly in the stiff peaty soil, and remained fixed. The
others, mad with fear, took no heed of his struggles and trumpetings,
but plunged on to meet the same fate. In five minutes the whole herd of
them were hopelessly bogged, and the more they struggled to escape, the
deeper they sunk. There was one exception, indeed, a cow managed to win
back to firm shore, and, lifting