Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-02-03


melodramatic manner.
Gregg is in a herd of elephants, "
said Flint. Hes out of hard-nose am
munition. Maybe we'll get q shot
Come on"
For an hour and half, We marched
through the blistering heat watching
| the legs of this black Paul Revere rise
and fall mechanically. Then, suddenly
rounding bush, we came on Gregg sit
| ting under a tree sclemnly watching a
very sick bull elephant rock slowly back
and forth on trembling legs. Almost at
once, it staggered and fell, burying j
tusk deeply into the hard earth.
There were twelve of them" said
Gregg, without emotion, as we came up.
They surrounded me as quietly as mice,
Five minutes before I had met rhino
face to face on narrow trail. He
rushed past me so close the mud on his
ribs was scraped of on my jacket After
he went everything was quiet.
when looked around again ele-
plants were all over the place. This
tusker was IL yards away. There
hadn't been a sound. The boys ran.
don't blame them. I tell you, ele-
plants were all over the place. I gave
this one the brain shot. heart shot,
tail shot and ran out of hard nose
anyway, I couldn't remember any other
places to shoot him. There he is, He's
dead" and he regarded the huge car
cass with an incredulous look.
Then he blew whistle, indicating to
the hundred odd black men swarm
ing about us that, we were through
viewing the remains. The corpse was
theirs.
WE now witnessed prehistoric orgy.
w in which men became beasts.
Stripped to the skin, the black scav-
engers leapt on the carcass with ghoul-
ish eagerness. Immediately 1t became
invisible beneath half hundred saw
ages. lusting for meat. Knee-deep, they
plunged and staggered. hacking off
such bits as they could lay hold on.
AS they tore loose handful Of meat.
they scaled It over the heads of the
others to confederate waiting on the
side lines, either woman or an old
man. who Immediately impaled 1t on
sharpaned stick-gobs of elephant
meat en- brouchette-or thrust it into
baskets of wild slsal woven on the spot.
A short distance away gray mon
key, with the face of q disillusioned
poet, sat on a limb and swung his legs.
One could almost imagine him remark
ing: THANK God, I'm vegetarian"
Soon came the turn of the old men
who had been nervously lowering on
the side lines like obscene birds Lack
ing the strength to. engage In the
melee, they had been forced to content
themselves with senile hopping up and
down. Now came their turn--nothing
was left but the bones.
A week later I watched a flock of
vultures perform an identical ceremony
over the body of a hartebeest weighing
$50 pounds. In almost every particular
the procedure was the same.
For 10 days we lived life of prime
val simplicity at the bottom of the Rift
Valley, chilled to the bone at night
parboiled at noon.
Day after day the sun rose in cloud
less sky Of cerulean blue-at least be-
lieve 1t was cerulean, but I had care
lessly left my dictionary at Nairobi: 50
I'll never know for sure.
Our camp had become a thriving
community. Each night saw dozen
fires surrounded by so boys enjoying
the sensation of fullness sequent on
crowding the stomach with much meat.
Our party had been augmented by most
of the able bodied members of the
Elgayo village.
The days had wings. We were obliv-
ious to time. When we estimated that
10 days had passed, we returned to the
farm, where found my son restored to
health. There we were informed by let
ter that the stateroom had been secured
for us on a boat sailing for Marseille
via Suez. We had five days to wait, SO
we rented an oX-wagon and drifted
down the Kedong Valley across q vast
plain filled with grants, tonmies, reed
buck, Gland, impalla, ostrich, hartebeest
and giraffe. We hunted, using the
, wagon as a base of supplies.
One morning we found the boy we
had left in charge was in very dis
turbed state of mind. The previous
night, as he slept beside the fire with a
small black dog as his only companion,
a leopard had stalked them and carried
off the dog. The rest of the night he
had spent in tree.
ITS against the law, but we'll set
a gun trap" said Flint.
The balance of the day we spent in
constructing, about two hundred yards
from our camp, a small circular enclo-
sure of thorns with narrow opening
over which rifle was secured, muzzle
| downward.
A string attached to the trigger was
arranged in such way that any ami
NAL pushing into the enclosure would
| discharge the gun and receive the
| bullet in the back of the neck. Bait
was placed within.
| At 8 o'clock we retired. At 9:l5 the
gun went of.
| \: X X
CLAD In pajamas, the way lighted by
~ a candle lantern, we approached
! the trap. There, lying on its stomach
with It's head between its paws. as
though asleep, was leopard. In the
light of the lantern its spots stood out
like jet on a background of yellow vel
vet. A beam of candle light illuminated
| its ewes Thev were round opalescert