| Gisco, Thos, Kalala, and the
company’s scout, Ndair, crouched behind the red veined, broad leaf shrubs. The plants
grew closely together forming a waist high hedge, partially surrounding the northwestern
embankment of Lake Nyanza. The others of their company remained on the back side of a
nearby slope, going about their morning chores before breaking camp. Between the hedge and
the wind ruffled waters of the lake was a hundred yards of very dark green grass. The
scene that held the travelers’ awed attention was being played out on that lawn. They
were down wind from the elephant, whose sense of smell was good, but whose eye sight and
hearing were poor. The animal, using its trunk, was striping a solitary baobab tree’s branches of its leaves for feed. They watched as the beast reduced the branches to pulp to get at the sap. He stood well over eleven feet - and weighed much more |
than the average six tons. Its ears were be
nearly four feet in breadth. What drew the hunters gaze was the six feet of twisted white
growth jutting from the corners of the huge beast’s mouth. A third of the tusks were
lodged in his skull, so their true length must be close to nine feet - weighing nigh on to
a hundred sixty pounds for the pair.
|
