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LESSON 11
IN the Island of Ceylon,
there are large herds of wild elephants. Many have been caught and tamed, and made useful in helping to build bridges, houses, and churches.
Travellers tell us, that some of them are as careful about the neatness of their work as men could be! An elephant has been known to step back a few yards to see if it had laid a block of wood or stone straight; and then, if not satisfied,
to return and push it into its right place!
Some years ago, an engineer in Ceylon had to lay pipes to convey water nearly two miles, over hills and
through woods where there were no roads. To help him in his work, he had to employ
several
elephants; and nothing could be more interesting
than to watch the way in which the elephant engineers did their work.
Lifting up one of the heavy pieces of pipe, and balancing it in its trunk, each animal would march off with its load, and carry it safely over every obstacle,
to the place where it was to be laid. When it reached the spot, it would kneel down and place the pipe exactly
where the driver wished.
Once, when one of the elephants found it hard to get one of the pipes it had brought fitted into another, it got up and went to the end of the pipe, and putting its head against it, soon forced it into its right place.
In a show of wild beasts at Bath, some years ago, there was a large good-natured elephant. Among the crowd that went to see it was a baker. He thought it a clever thing to tease the elephant, by pretending to give it a cake, and then pulling away his hand.
The elephant bore this for some time well enough, but at last it got angry. Putting its trunk out of the cage, it caught the baker round the waist, lifted him to the top of the caravan, and bumped his head with great force against the roof.
Everybody thought the man would be killed. But all at once the elephant loosened its trunk, and dropped him from the roof to the ground, in the very midst of the people. There he lay for a minute or two, looking half dead; but when the people came to him, he got up and walked away as if nothing had happened.
Though he was very much frightened, he was not hurt; but you may be sure he never tried to play tricks upon elephants again.
A poor woman, in one of the cities of India, had a stall in the market-place, where she sold fruit. An elephant used to go by, and always stopped to look at her stall. She knew how fond the elephant was of fruit; and she used, now and then, to give him some.
One day the elephant fell into a passion with his keeper. He broke loose, and ran through the market, trampling down everything before him.
The people at the stalls ran away as fast as they could. The poor woman left her stall and ran too. But she forgot, in her fright, that her little child was sitting on the ground, close by the stall!
It was just in the elephant’s way, and you would think it must have been trampled to death. But the elephant knew the child again, and knew that this was the stall where he had been fed with fruit.
Though he was in a passion, he stopped. He looked at the child, and picked it up with his trunk. Then he set it out of his way, and went on. You may think how glad the poor woman was to see her child safe.
Where are there large herds of wild elephants? For what are they useful when tamed? What are the elephants in the picture doing? When did this take place? What did one of the elephants do when it could not get the pipe to fi t? What did the elephant at Bath do to the baker who teased him? How did the poor woman in India make the elephant her friend? How did he reward her?
el´-e-phants car´-a-van a-ware´ use´-ful care´-ful
trav´-el-lers fright´-ened tram´-pled bridg´-es con-vey´
neat´-ness hap´-pened pre-tend´-ing hous´-es mar´-ket
bal´-anc-ing swal´-low loos´-ened church´-es al´-ways
