Should he retreat, you follow him; but you may shortly discover that he is leading you to some favourite haunt of thick jungle or high grass, from which, when you least expect it, he will suddenly burst out in full charge upon you.
Next to a 'rogue' in ferocity, and even more persevering in the pursuit of her victim, is a female elephant when her young one has been killed.
In such a case she will generally follow up her man until either he or she is killed.

If any young elephants are in the herd, the mothers frequently prove awkward customers.
Elephant-shooting is doubtless the most dangerous of all sports if the game is invariably followed up; but there is a great difference between elephant-killing and elephant-hunting; the latter is sport, the former is slaughter.
Many persons who have killed elephants know literally nothing about the sport, and they may ever leave Ceylon with the idea that an elephant is not a dangerous animal.

Their elephants are killed in this way, viz.: The party of sportsmen, say two or three, arrive at a certain district.
The headman is sent for from the village; he arrives.

The enquiry respecting the vicinity of elephants is made; a herd is reported to be in the neighbourhood, and trackers and watchers are sent out to find them.
In the meantime the tent is pitched, our friends are employed in unpacking the guns, and, after some hours have elapsed, the trackers return: they have found the herd, and the watchers are left to observe them.
The guns are loaded and the party starts.

The trackers run quickly on the track until they meet one of the watchers who has been sent back upon the track by the other watchers to give the requisite information of the movements of the herd since the trackers left.