Chap. 8.] 
ELEPHANTS. 
255 
trample upon them.^^ They will never do any mischief except 
when provoked, and they are of a disposition so sociable, that 
they always move about in herds, no animal being less fond of 
a solitary life. When surrounded by a troop of horsemen, 
they place in the centre of the herd those that are weak, 
weary, or wounded, and then take the front rank each in its 
turn, just as though they acted under command and in accord- 
ance with discipline. When taken captive, they are very 
speedily tamed, by being fed on the juices of barley. 
CHAP. 8. (8.) — THE WAY IK WHICH ELEPHA]J^TS AEE CAUGHT. 
In India they are caught by the keeper guiding one of the 
tame elephants towards a wild one which he has found alone or 
has separated from tjie herd ; upon which he beats it, and when 
it is fatigued mounts and manages it just the same way as the 
other. In Africa they take them in pit-falls ; but as soon as 
an elephant gets into one, the others immediately collect boughs 
of trees and pile up heaps of earth, so as to form a mound, and 
then endeavour with all their might to drag it out. It was for- 
merly the practice to tame them by driving the herds with horse- 
men into a narrow defile, artificially made in such a way as 
to deceive them by its length; and when thus enclosed by means 
of steep banks and trenches, they were rendered tame by the 
52 This trait has been observed in all ages ; the elephant has been known 
to remove with its trunk a child lying in its way, and in danger of being 
injured. It appears to have an instinctive dread of trampling on a living 
animal ; the same has also been observed in the horse. — B. 
53 u jjordeo succo ;" the exact meaning has been the subject of much 
discussion ; it probably refers to some preparation of barley used by the 
ancients, perhaps a maceration of the corn in water ; it is scarcely to be 
supposed, however, that the words are to be taken literally. — B. 
Albertus Magnus, in his work on Animals, B. viii. c. 3, gives a fuller 
account of this method of taking the wild elephant. He says : " A man, 
riding on a tame elephant, guides him to the woods, and when he has met 
with some wild ones, drives the tame one against them, and makes it 
strike them with its trunk : the tame one, being better fed, soon conquers 
the wild elephant, and throws him to the ground ; upon which, the man 
leaps upon him, and flogs him with a whip, and immediately the other be- 
comes quiet." Strabo, B. xv., gives a different account of the mode of 
catching and taming the elephant in India. 
^5 This appears to have been taken from Plutarch ; and we have the 
same statement in ^lian, who particularly speaks of the sagacity of the 
animal, in endeavouring to extricate itself from the trench. — B. 
