The reader who can get up an enthusiasm for this
class of thing we should not define as a sportsman. The fatality of "the single shot in forehead "—" four inches above the centre of an imaginary line connecting the eyes "—is at variance with the experience of every elephant-hunter whose accounts we remember to have read, or to have heard in verbal description. Sir S. Baker again and again tried this shot, and never but once succeeded with it, in spite of the enormously heavy rifles he used. Our own experience is the same, and is moreover opposed to the statement that an elephant when shot in the head falls stunned if the brain is not penetrated. We do not ever recollect seeing a herd of buffaloes carrying their "tails erect and backs up " when galloping. "Bala N'zau" makes no secret of his custom of shooting doe-antelope, and even tells us (p. 193) of one occasion upon which, on a " pitch-dark " might, he and his friend waylaid a herd of elephants, and discharged their heavy guns into their " shadowy forms." Next morning, they were apparently proud to find that their '° shots had told" by the !blood-trail. If it were possible for any man with the instincts of a sportsman to be concerned in such a murderous exploit, we should at least imagine that he would desire to enshroud its memory in secrecy and oblivion. The following are a few of the adaptations to which "English as she is spoke " by Bala N'zau is made to submit :—" The longest skin of the python I ever saw" (p. 57) ; " But not a vestige now, of which was to be seen, it having been overgrown," &c. (p. 96) ; " I aimed for her—it was a cow—heart" (p. 243).
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