The Elephant 13 



gerated form of the sensitive pride belonging to human 

 character, and, through some unexplainable process of 

 thought, reconcile its coexistence with the malignant 

 temper of a murderous brute. The way in which one of 

 their attendants talks to an elephant whom he suspects 

 is strange enough. This man despises his intellect, and 

 knows his character thoroughly. " Have I ever been 

 wanting in respect .■* Astagh-fiir-Ulla. God forbid ! Let 

 my Lord remember how yesterday at bathing-time he 

 was placed under a tree, while that son of Satan, Said 

 Bahadur, stood in the sun. Who has provided your 

 highness with sugar-cane, and placed lumps of goor 

 between your back teeth .'' I represent that this, oh, pro- 

 tector of the poor, it was my good fortune to do. Hereafter 

 I will deprive those unsainted ones about you of their pro- 

 visions and bestow them upon you." That is the way a 

 Hindu talks, hoping to mollify the animal. 



Certain traits in animals have come to be accepted as 

 peculiarly significant of their respective grades ; parental 

 affection, for example. The male elephant is as nearly as 

 possible without a trace of this feeling, but his polygamous 

 habits account to a great extent for the deficiency. It is a 

 quality which greatly preponderates in females of most 

 species, and in one so elevated we might expect to find 

 that this, as Buffon asserts, was a prominent trait. 

 Frederick Green informs us, however, that "the female 

 elephant does not appear to have the affection for her off- 

 spring which one would be led to suppose, " and his view 

 is very far from being singular. The author has not 

 found any justification in facts for Buffon's assertion to 



