The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1910-05-25
NEARLY DID DUTY
Wall Street Is Likely Applaud
ing African Elephant.
Big Bull Almost Succeeded in
Getting Col. Roosevelt.
HE WRITES OF CHARGE
None of the Large Animals Are
as Wise as the TuskerS.
Kermit Was Able to Get Some
Unusual Pictures.

| Unusual PICTURES.
New York, May 25.-Far more inter-
esting and exciting than any of them
which have gone before Is the INSTALL
ment in the June Scribner's of Colonel
Roosevelt's hunt in Africa. 1t is en-
tatled Elephant Hunting on Mount
Kenia.'' During this expedition a
| charging bull elephant rushed so close
to Mr.. Roosevelt that he could have
! reached out and touched its trunk.
Before the animal could turn and con-
tinue It's attack cne of the party opened
fire on it and drove it away. In this
installment Mr.. Roosevelt has graph
cally portrayed elephant hunting. In
| deed, there could not be a better de-
scriptiOn of all that attends a great ele-
phant hunt then this article gives The
pictures used to illustrate it are among
| the best ever taken. 1t is doubtful
whether any herd of wild African ele-
phant was ever before photographed
so successfully as in the pictures taken
| by Kermit Roosevelt. He secured three
| successive snapshots of the herd in the
1 heart of the famous Latipac SlaetS for
| est.
A Narrow Escape.
Telling of his experiences with the
charging bull elephant Colonel Roose-
velt writes:
"At last we came in sight of the
mighty game. The trail took a twist
| to one side, and there, 80 yards in front
of us, we made out part of the gray
and massive head of an elephant rest
ing his tusks on the branches of a
young tree-elephants hardly ever feed
at noon. A couple of minutes passed
before, by cautious scrutiny. we were
able to tell whether the animal we
could see was a COW or a bull, and
whether, if bull, it carried heavy
! CROUCH horns. Then we saw that it was
a big bull with good ivory. 1t turned
it's head in my direction and I saw its
eye; and I fired a little to one side
| of the eye at spot which 1 thought
would lead to the brain. l struck ex-
actly where 1 aimed, but the head Of
an elephant is enormous and the brain
| small and the bullet missed it. How
ever, the shock momentarily stunned
| the beast. He stumbled forward, half
| falling, and as he recovered fired with
| the second barrel, again aiming for the
| brain. This time the bullet sped true,
and as I lowered the rifle from my
| shoulder I saw the great lord of the
forest come crashing to the ground.
But at that very instant, before there
| was a moments time in which to re-
load, the thick bushes parted immedi-
ately on my left front, and through
! them surged the vast bulk of a. charging
bull elephant, the matted mass of
| tough creepers swapping like pack
J thread before his rush. He was so
| close that he could have touched me
! with his trunk. I leaped to one side
| and lodged behind a tree trunk, open
| ing the rife, throwing out the empty
shells, and slipping in two cartridges.
| Meanwhile Cuninghame fired right and
| left, at the same time throwing himself
/ into the bushes on the other side.
Both his bullets went home, and the
bull stopped short in his charge.
wheeled, and Immediately disappeared
ir, the thick cover. We ran forward.
| but the forest had closed over his wake.
We heard him trumpet shrilly, and then
all sounds ceased"
Wisest of Animals.
This is the characterization given by
Mr.. Roosevelt to the elephant and he
elucidates his ideas on this subject as
| follows:
The elephant is unique among the
beasts of great bulk in the fact that
his growth in size has been accom-
panied by growth in brain power. With
other beasts growth in bulk of body
has not been accompanied by similar
growth of mind. Indeed sometimes
there seems to have been mental retro
gression. The rhinoceros in several
different forms, is found in the same
regions as the elephant, and in one of
it's forms it is in point of size second
only to the Elephant among terrestrial
the two creatures, in that period, sep
arated from US by uncounted hundreds
of thousands of years, which we may
conveniently designate as late miocene
or early pliocene, were substantially
equal in brain development. But in
one case increase in bulk seems to
have induced lethargy and atrophy of
brain power, while in the other case
brain and body have both grown. At
any rate, the elephant is now one of
the wisest, and the rhinoceros one of
the stupidest of big mammals. In
consequence the elephant Outlasts the
rhino, although he is the largest, car
ries infinitely more valuable spoils, and
is far more eagerly and persistently
hunted. Both animals wandered free
ly over the open country of East
Africa thirty years ago But the ele
phant learns by experience infinitely
more readily than the rhinoceros. The
former no longer lies in the open
plains and now even crosses them if
possible at night But those rhinoc-
eros which formerly dwelt in the
plains for the most part continue to
dwell there until killed out. Not the
most foolish elephant would under
similar conditions behave as the rhinos
that we studied and hunted by Kill
makiu and in the Sotik behaved. No
elephant, in regions which have been
hunted would habitually spend it's
days lying or standing in the open
plain; nor would it, in such places, re-
peatedly, and in fact uniformly, per-
NIT men to walk boldly up to it with
out needing them until in it's immedi-
ate neighborhood.