The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals: A Book of Personal ObservationsHornaday, William T. (William Temple)
Science
The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals: A Book of Personal Observations
Hornaday, William T. (William Temple)
Animal behavior
I invite any Doubting Thomas who thinks that Kartoum does not
"think" and "reason" to try his own thinking and reasoning at
inventing for Kartoum's door a latch that a keeper can easily and
surely open and close at a distance of ten feet, and that will be
Kartoum-proof. As for ourselves, three or four seemingly
intelligent officers and keepers, and a capable foreman of
construction, have all they can do to keep ahead of that one
elephant, so great is his ingenuity in thwarting our ways and
means to restrain him.
In about two days of effort our elephant keepers taught Gunda to
receive a coin from the hand of a visitor, or pick it off the
floor, lift the lid of a high-placed cash-box, drop the coin into
it and ring a bell. This very amusing industry was kept up for
several years, but finally it became so popular that it had to be
discontinued.
Keeper Dick Richards easily taught Alice to blow a mouth organ,
and to ring a telephone, to take the receiver off its hook and
hold it to her ear and listen. For years Alice has rendered, every
summer, valuable services of a serious nature in carrying children
and other visitors around her yard, and only once or twice has she
shown a contrary or obstinate spirit.
Tame elephants never tread on the feet of their attendants or
knock them down by accident; or, at least, no instances of the
kind have come to my knowledge. The elephant's feet are large, his
range of vision is circumscribed, and his extreme and wholly
voluntary solicitude for the safety of his human attendants can
not be due to anything else than independent reasoning. The most
intelligent dog is apt to greet his master by planting a pair of
dirty paws against his coat or trousers. The most sensible
carriage-horse is liable to step on his master's foot or crowd him
against a wall in a moment of excitement; but even inside the
keddah, with wild elephants all about, and a captive elephant
hemmed in by three or four tame animals, the noosers safely work
under the bodies and between the feet of the tame elephant until
the feet of the captive are tied.
All who have witnessed the tying of captives in a keddah wherein a
whole wild herd has been entrapped, testify to the uncanny human-
like quality of the intelligence displayed by the tame elephants
who assist in tying, leading out and subjugating the wild
captives. They enter into the business with both spirit and
understanding, and as occasion requires will deceitfully cajole or
vigorously punish a troublesome captive. Sir Emerson Tennent
asserts that the tame elephants display the most perfect
conception of every movement, both of the object to be attained
and the means to accomplish it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account