urned at right angles to the
line of march and struck due west, treading the track of the herd.

Nothing is more exciting than this following in the track of a mammoth
army whose tactics you cannot foresee. This herd might be simply moving a
few miles in search of a new feeding ground, or it might be making one of
those great sweeping marches covering hundreds of miles that the
mysterious elephant people make at the dictates of their mysterious
instinct. It might be moving at a gentle pace, or swifter than a man could
run. A mile on the new route they came on a broken tree, a great tree
broken down as if by a storm; the fractures were quite recent. The
elephant folk had done this. They came across another tree whose sides,
facing north and south, had been clearly barked, and the pieces of the
bark, farther on, that had been chewed and flung away.

With one stroke of a tusk passing a tree, and without stopping, an
elephant will tear off a strip of bark; and it was curious to see how the
bark of this tree to east and west was intact. The moving herd had not
stopped. Just in passing, an elephant on either side of the tree had taken
his slice of bark, chewed it and flung it away. There were also small
trees trodden down mercilessly under foot. Thus the great track of the
herd lay before the hunters, but not a sign in all the sunlit, silent
country before them of the herd itself.

It was Berselius's aim to crowd up his men as quickly as a forced march
could do it, camp and then pursue the herd with a few swift followers, the
barest possible amount of stores and one tent.

The calabashes and the water bottles had been filled at the last halt, but
it was desirable to find water for the evening's camping place.

It was now that Berselius showed his capacity as a driver and his own
enormous store of energy.

He took the tail of the column, and woe to the porters who lagged behind!
Felix was with him, and Adams, who was heading the column, could hear the
shouts of the Zappo Zap. The men with their loads went at a quick walk,
sometimes breaking into a trot, urged forward by the gun-butt of Felix.

The heat was sweltering, but there was no rest. On, on, on, ever on
through a country that changed not at all; the same breaks and ridges, the
same limitless plains of waving grass, the same scant trees, the same
heat-shaken horizon toward which the elephant road led straight,
unwavering, endless.

The brain reeled with the heat