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Our arrival was welcomed with general enthusiasm, as the Arabs were unprovided with fire-arms, and the celebrated aggageers or sword-hunters were useless, as the elephants only appeared at night, and were far too cunning to give them a chance.
I now reloaded my rifles, and the aggageers quitted the jungle to remount their horses, as they expected the herd had broken cover on the other side of the jungle, in which case they intended to give chase, and, if possible, to turn them back into the covert and drive them toward the guns.
Upon arrival at this spot the aggageers, who appeared to know every inch of the country, declared that, unless the elephants had gone far away, they must be close at hand, within the forest. We were speculating upon the direction of the wind, when we were surprised by the sudden trumpeting of an elephant, that proceeded from the forest already declared to be the covert of the herd.
He fell like a stone to the shot, but almost immediately he regained his feet and bounded off, receiving a bullet from the second barrel without a flinch. In full speed he rushed away across the party of aggageers about three hundred yards distant.
The latter were the most celebrated aggageers among the renowned tribe of the Hamran; their father and grandfather had been mighty Nimrods, and the broadswords wielded by their strong arms had descended to the men who now upheld the prestige of the ancient blades. The eldest was Taher Sherrif; his second brother, Roder Sherrif, was a very small, active-looking man, with a withered left arm.
As there were no guns, two of the aggageers, utterly reckless of consequences, resolved to ride through the narrow passages formed by the large game, and to take their chance with the elephant, sword in hand.
Instead of leading the elephant by the flight of one man and horse, according to their usual method, all the aggageers at the same moment sprang from their saddles, and upon foot in the heavy sand they attacked the elephant with their swords. In the way of sport, I never saw anything so magnificent, or so absurdly dangerous.
This was a signal for story-telling, when suddenly the aggageers changed the conversation by a few tales of the Bas-e natives, which so thoroughly eclipsed the dangers of wild beasts that in a short time the entire party would almost have welcomed a lion, provided he would have agreed to protect them from the Bas-e.
Florian, poor fellow, had not the necessary tools for the work, and one of his light guns produced no effect. Now came the time for the aggageers. Away dashed Jali on his fiery mare, closely followed by Abou Do and Suleiman, who in a few instants were obscured in the cloud of dust raised by the retreating buffaloes.
At daybreak the next morning, the aggageers in high glee mounted their horses, and with a long retinue of camels, and men provided with axes and knives, together with large gum sacks to contain the flesh, they quitted the camp to cut up the numerous elephants.
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