They have to be humoured at their work or they turn sulky. They work three days and rest three days. If they get ill, pills made of fiery chillies are rubbed into the eyes. This is probably the only animal that takes pills with its eyes. The animals get at least one bath a day. They will not drag one log for a long distance; but having brought it, say, for three-quarters of a mile, they go back and fetch another. When they have collected a little pile all in the same place, they set off again, carrying each of the logs about another three-quarters of a mile, and returning for the rest. They never cross a bridge without first testing it with one foot to see if they think that it is safe. They are afraid of ponies, and by Siamese law, a pony meeting an elephant has to get out of the way. Once or twice a year there is a big elephant-hunt at Ayuthia, the old capital. At the beginning of the wet season orders are sent forth that elephants are to be collected. A number of men traverse the plain where the elephants have been allowed to roam unmolested, and drive them in towards the town. [Illustration: AN ELEPHANT HUNT AT AYUTHIA. _Page 72._] People of all classes go to Ayuthia to see the fun--Princes and peasants, Europeans and Asiatics, laymen and priests. There is a great deal of excitement, particularly when the elephants are expected. Presently an enormous tusker is seen. This is a tame elephant. He walks slowly in front, and the crowd of wild elephants behind who have taken him for their leader follow like a flock of sheep, except that they make more noise. Round the outside of the herd there are other tame elephants, carrying men on their backs who are armed with spears. At last they reach the river. They stop for a moment, but the big tusker marches on in front, and the others are pushing at the back, so into the water they all go. They swim to the other side of the river, and there the mounted elephants get the whole herd into line again, pretending all the while to be their friends. Then the tusker marches into a big enclosure set round with posts, and thence through a gateway into a second enclosure. By this time some of the wild elephants have an idea that they are being trapped, and they try to go back; but the guard-elephants stand quite steady, and the men on their backs make good use of their spears. So at last the captives are brought into a square space surrounded by a high, thick wall, on which hundreds of spectators are crowded, watching the operations. This ends the first day.