At Jaipur, Gwalior, and a number of other towns where there is a fort
on a hill, elephants can be hired for the ascension. The huge creatures
knelt down while we clambered into the howdah with the aid of ladders.
When they rose, it seemed like an earthquake to us on their backs. They
climbed the hill so slowly that the others of the party who walked
arrived ahead of us. Our huthi would smell about carefully with his
trunk before taking each step, then he would put a huge foot forward
cautiously, and throw his great weight upon it slowly, as if afraid
that the earth would give way under him. It took him so long to
accommodate his four feet to each step, that I was thankful he had not
as many as a centiped.
To appreciate an elephant in all his glory, one should see him in the
splendor of princely procession. Designs in bright colors are painted
on his forehead and trunk, trappings of silver ornament his tusks,
head, and ankles, a rich cloth of gold and silver embroidery hangs over
his colossal sides, and on his back is perched a rare howdah, often of
gold and silver, with silk hangings. Aloft in the howdah rides the
prince, resplendent with gold, silk, and jewels. In front, on the
elephant's neck, sits the mahout, urging him on with strange-sounding
grunts, and prods from a short pointed spear.
The elephants are reserved for state occasions. Most of the princes now
have automobiles, which they look upon much as a child does its latest
toy. The mass of the people depend upon the bullocks and horses to cart
them about. There are now, also, in most parts of the empire,
telephones and telegraphs; but they are such ancient systems and so
unreliable that they are not to be compared with ours. India is through
and through a lazy country, where nobody is in a hurry.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
WHERE THE SUNSETS OF ALL THE YESTERDAYS ARE FOUND
BY OLIN D. WHEELER
In Montana, Idaho, and northern Wyoming lies the region where center
the headwaters of the Missouri, Yellowstone, Green, and Snake
rivers--the last named a branch of the Columbia. In the early years of
the last century it was virtually the center of all human activity in
the Rocky Mountain region, being a prolific, but dangerous,
trapping-ground for the fur trade of those days.
Here the cloud-piercing peaks of the American Rockies reach their
greatest altitude, and the scenery is of the wildest and most
impressive character. The Grand Teton, 13,747 feet elevation,
overlooking the magnificent Jackson Lake basin, has been climbed but
twice by white men.
Since the Yellowstone Park was established, in 1872, the wonders of
this region have been more or less familiar. But prior to 1870 they
were believed to exist largely in the fertile imagination of the
trapper.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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