TRAVELLERS’ TALES

Evening Star, Issue 23145, 20 December 1938, Page 1

TRAVELLERS’ TALES

SOME SENSATIONAL YARNS EXAMINING THE EVIDENCE Is there a secret valley where wild elephants go to dieP asks a writer in the ‘ Sunday Express.’ What giant beast—dreaded and unseen—haunts the slopes of Everest, leaving footprints in the snow? Does the brontosaurus-like reptile described by African natives. really exist in the primeval swamps? What animal made the 21in footprints seen in the unexplored forests of Brazil? Sensational though these yarns may seem, there is evidence in support of each, and it is thrilling to examine it. For the tales come from all over the world—Asia, Africa, South America—and each one concerns a creature of immense size. Probably the oldest belief of all, and the most fabulous, is that of Elephant Valley.

Nearly everyone has heard the legend that when a wild elephant feels death approaching it departs on its last long journey to a secret valley to die. The remains of dead elephants have hardly ever been found in the jungle. I spent 10 years of my childhood in the Indian wilds, where my father was forest officer, and the only dead wild elephant I saw or heard of was a “ rogue ” shot by him. The lords of the forest seem to disappear rather than to die.

One white man at least has produced evidence that he has actually been in an elephant cemetery'. He is Flightlieutenant Melton, a Royal Flying Corps officer, who was forced down in a marsh in German East Africa. On the fourth day of his walk to civilisation he saw, in a rocky vale, a multitude of tusks and bleached skeletons. Not far away lay a dying elephant. Just as glamorous as the legendary Elephant Valley are the giant footprints that have been seen in the Himalayas. ; From our summer bungalow in India we looked across a gulf of valleys to the eternal snows—the Roof of the world.

Those peaks of glowing fire-opal, re-. mote 1 and desolate,' are the home of the supposed “ abominable snowman ” —the beast which, so the hill natives swear, is the one that leaves the weird spoor.

Round and large as an elephant’s the strange footprints have been known to naturalists for more than 60 years. Could an unknown creature really inhabit those frozen wastes, or is there a commonplace explanation for the spoor ? From time to time ever since the strange tracks have been seen. One of the last to report them was Mr Eric Shipton, the lone climber, who came on them in the snow at the 16,000 ft level above Ranikhet last year, Mr Shipton examined the tracks with care. Apparently a few days old, large and round as an elephant’s, they ran along the whole side of a ridge and then vanished. The stretch between each suggested a very long reach for a biped. The two natives with him were terrified, saying it was very unlucky to have seen the tracks, and that if they caught sight of the beast itself they would be killed and eaten.

In spite of all reason, the whole thing remains as one of the most glamorous mysteries of the wild. It is largely upon the evidence of footprints, too, that there have come to us from the forests of Brazil fresh yarns of an anthropoid ape 12ft high. In the heart of Brazil lies Goyaz, one of the most backward States, largely unexplored.

It is mostly scrubby plateau country, deeply eroded by rivers. Impenetrable forests fringe most of the streams, and these are said to be the home of great apes.

Quite recently gold prospectors on the banks of the Araguaya River have heard roars coming from the forest, and have found gigantic footprints 21in long, shaped like those of a man. Lastly, what would you say if it was suggested that the world’s largest reptile had not yet been discovered by civilised man?

Impossible? Perhaps, but a 10ft lizard did remain undiscovered until 1912, and another huge reptile is described by African natives.