90 
SCENES IN INDIA. 
upwards of twenty in number, had made a full meal. 
By this time a shrill sound was heard from one of 
the elephants, which was readily understood, when 
those that were still in the building immediately 
rushed out and joined their companions. One of the 
first division, after retiring from the granary, had acted 
as sentinel while the rest were enjoying the fruits of 
their sagacity and perseverance. He had so stationed 
himself as to be enabled to observe the advance of an 
enemy from any quarter, and, upon perceiving the 
troops as they returned from the village, he sounded 
the signal of retreat, when the whole herd, flourishing 
their trunks, moved rapidly into the jungle. 
Information had been conveyed to the officer com- 
manding the guard, before he reached the village, that 
the elephants had attacked the granary ; he arrived 
however too late with his detachment to save it. Upon 
entering, he found that the plunderers had devoured 
and destroyed the greater part of what it contained. 
A ball from a small field-piece was discharged at them 
in their retreat ; but they only wagged their tails, 
as if in mockery, and soon disappeared in the recesses 
of their native forests. 
A large painting of the subject of the dead elephant, (see page 
8.1 ,) has been made by Mr. William Daniell for Colonel le Baron 
de Noual de la Loyrie, a very liberal patron of art. 
