The elephant in a heavily wooded country is greatly appreciated in time of war; as their huge bodies can crush through the underbrush, trample down the reeds, and make a good road, over which the gun-carriages and teams can be hauled. A writer on an early Burmese war says, “The road lay partly through a thick jungle; but with the aid of three elephants, a passage was forced.” When a bog is met, or roads have been overflowed, making ordinary passage almost impossible, the elephants, under direction of their mahouts, place their heads (the base of the trunk) against the teams, and push them along, or take ropes attached to the gun-carriages between their teeth, and haul them out of the mire. Capt. Williamson lays much stress upon the importance of the work performed by these animals. “Many of our most arduous military operations have been greatly indebted for their success to the sagacity, patience, and exertion of elephants. Exclusive of their utility in carrying baggage and stores, considerable aid is frequently supplied by the judgment they display, bordering very closely on reason. When cannon require to be extricated from sloughs, the elephant, placing his forehead to the muzzle,—which, when limbered, is the head of the piece,—with an energy scarcely to be conceived, will urge it through a bog, from which hundreds of oxen or horses could not drag it. At other times, lapping his trunk round the cannon, he will lift, while the cattle and men pull forward. The native princes attach an elephant to each cannon, to aid its progress in emergencies. For this purpose, the animal is furnished with a thick leather pad, covering the forehead, to prevent its being injured. It has sometimes happened, that in narrow roads or causeways, or on banks, the soil has given way under heavy cannon; when an elephant, being applied to the falling side, has not only prevented the piece from upsetting, but even aided it forward to a state of security.” Small howitzers, that can be placed upon the elephant’s back, were not the only guns the animals had to carry. Aurengzebe had cannon in his army which required twenty yoke of oxen, besides elephants, who pushed at the wheels, and hauled. The patience and fidelity of the elephant when on the march are proverbial, and they can nearly always be depended upon. In the steep passes, or ghauts, of India, the work is often of the most laborious description. An eye-witness thus describes a scene where their pluck and sagacity were put most thoroughly to the test:—