UP A TREE AGAIN! They might have remained longer on the ground lamenting this irreparable loss, but that they were still apprehensive of the return of the elephant.

Whither had it gone?
That was the question which one was addressing to the other, while the eyes of all kept turning in different directions, and with glances that betrayed their uneasiness.
The rogue could not have been off the ground more than a very few minutes: the grass that he had trampled down was still wet with its own sap, crushed out by his ponderous weight.

And yet he might have been seen all around for nearly a quarter of a mile's distance.

There was no timber within that distance that could have given concealment to an animal so bulky as an elephant?
So thought Karl and Caspar; but Ossaroo was of a different opinion.

The bit of jungle through which they had passed would suffice to screen the rogue, said he: adding at the same time a piece of intelligence derived from his shikaree experience: that an elephant, large as it is, can hide in a slight cover with wonderful cunning; that its sagacity enables it to select the best place for concealment; and that, although it neither crouches nor squats, it contrives, by keeping perfectly still--added to the circumstance of its being a shapeless sort of mass--ofttimes to elude the eye of the most vigilant hunter.