Mobita had views on protective colouring. Who is Mobita? Oh, an elephant hunter, a black man; a very good fellow—as black men go. Mobita used to say that elephants, and big and small game generally, could not see black and white. Black they could and white they could, but not a judicious combination of the two. His usual hunting kit was a black hat with a white feather in it, a black waistcoat over a white shirt, a black and white striped loin cloth. His thin arms and legs were dull ebony. There you have Mobita.

Mobita's theory worked very well for a time, but as he had missed an essential he paid the penalty in the end. A zebra is black and white—more or less—and in the bush is practically invisible so long as it stands still. That, then, is the essential adjunct to protective colouring—you must keep still.

This is what happened to Mobita.

Just before the war I was hunting on the edge of the Great Swamp. Early one afternoon, when the day was at its hottest, I heard a shot fired. Later, I met a freshly-wounded tusker and dropped him. I went up to have a look at him, and found dry blood on his ground tusk and a hole behind his near shoulder; someone had just missed his heart. My shot took him in the ear.

I left some of my men to cut out his tusks, and, out of curiosity, went back along his spoor. I had not far to go. Sitting round a pile of green branches I found a dozen of Mobita's people, looking very glum.

They told me their yarn, which I did not believe until I had had a look round for myself. The spoor told me their story was true enough.

It appears that Mobita had followed the bull since early morning. He got in a moderate shot; the bull saw him and gave chase. The ground was unbroken, with no large ant-hills or big trees to dodge behind. Here and there they went, this way and that, but the tusker kept his eye on Mobita—on his protective colouring, I should think. Then somehow Mobita tripped and fell, and the game was up. The elephant stamped on him, knelt on him, put his tusk through him. Then—and here is the strange part of it all—went from tree to tree picking green branches and piling them up on what was left of Mobita.

Then he moved off and shortly met me.

Did I bury Mobita? Why, no. People came around presently—as natives will when meat is about—and I made them pile stones on him; quite a hill they made. I paid them for their trouble with elephant meat, and handed the tusks to Mobita's men, as the custom is.

Protective colouring is all right, no doubt—if you keep still.