150 BOMBAY DUCKS 
the elephant, which every child is made to read. It 
will be remembered that the sagacious creature was 
taking a constitutional through an Indian bazaar. It 
happened to turn its trunk in the direction of a divaze 
who was at work, and this individual pricked the 
elephant’s trunk with his needle. The elephant passed 
quietly on. The next day it came strolling through 
the same bazaar and, as it passed the atrvzze who had 
pricked its trunk, soused him with dirty water, which 
it had carefully secreted in its trunk. This is held up 
as an example of the way in which the noble quad- 
ruped revenged itself on its tormentor. 
Let us suppose the facts are as stated—I am far 
from believing this, but let us for the moment suppose 
them to be true—what evidence is there to show that 
the elephant squirted water by way of revenge? If it 
did so, it would have to understand that tailors in 
white clothes dislike dirty water. Now, how could an 
elephant possibly know this? If there is one thing 
which it enjoys more than another, it is having water 
thrown over it ; an elephant never loses an opportunity 
of dashing water over itself with its trunk, and the 
animal would naturally expect every other creature 
to like what it likes, 
If one does a good turn to a small child who is 
sucking a sweet, that child will, if it be of a nice 
disposition, and not old enough to know better, prob- 
ably take the sweet out of its mouth and offer its 
benefactor a suck! This it does, not in order to annoy 
the latter, but by way of showing its gratitude. So 
that, if the elephant did squirt the water over the 
