A FEW ELEPHANT STORIES. 185 



'' This elephant had, before the caiiipaign, been used 

 as a watchman by his owner, whose estates bordered 

 on a river. Marauders would drop down the stream 

 in their craft, and rob the gardens and orchards, and 

 lie off again without leaving any other trace of their 

 coming than the empty trees and ravaged beds. Tired 

 of losing the fruits of his labor, the owner had trained 

 this elephant to perform sentinel duty along the bank ; 

 and, when danger threatened, the animal would growd 

 like a dog, and filling his huge trunk with water from 

 the stream, would play upon the rascals like a fire- 

 engine, drowning them out of their boat like rats, 

 until they were glad to hoist sail and make off to 

 the best of their ability." 



The art of hunting the elephant, although of most 

 ancient origin, is practised to-day on a larger scale than 

 ever before, because of the services Avhich the Ena-lish 

 have found he can perform for them. As long as ele- 

 phants were used simply to add splendor to the suite 

 of a rajah, or dignity to one of the religious proces- 

 sions, it sufficed to hunt single animals, capturing them 

 by a decoy elephant ridden by a native, wdio provoked 

 and held the attention of the game, wdiile another ran 

 up behind and cleverly passed a chain around one of 

 his legs. Bound in this way the elephant was sure, 

 under the influence of starvation, and the example of 

 his former companions, to yield eventually to his captors. 

 Now the country is divided into " preserves," over which 



