“Get away from that bull!” It was the warning of an elephant man. “She’s sore! She’ll sap you in a minute!”
But the canvasman only laughed, announced that he knew Old Mom, and persisted. Again she pushed him away and for a third time, growing more and more fretful. A low bellow sounded. The canvasman did not heed the warning. Instead, he grasped her trunk and strove to raise it that he might pour the liquor into her mouth. Then it happened!
A quick thrust of the head, a lightning-like curling of the trunk, and Old Mom has lashed forth, striking the man a terrific blow in the pit of the stomach and knocking him half across the menagerie. Hurrying bull-tenders reached him and assisted him to his feet. Then, groaning, he reeled out of the tent, and rolling himself in a piece of canvas outside the side wall, complained for a time of his injuries, then went to sleep. But Old Mom was not satisfied.
The day was a breezy one, and the side wall was continually being raised, giving the elephant intermittent sights of her tormentor. All that afternoon she watched him, but gave no evidence of her anger. Then when the time for the evening meal came and the menagerie was deserted, she quietly untied her fastenings, moved ponderously forward, straight through the side wall, jerked the unfortunate drunkard from his wrappings of canvas, raised the dazed man high, then crashed him to the ground, stamped upon him, and at last, with one great swirl of her trunk, lashed her unfortunate victim into a pile of iron tent stakes. After which she returned to her place in line, calm and apparently satisfied!
Nor was there seemingly any remorse upon her part for her action, a condition which saved her from punishment. According to her way of figuring, she had been tormented beyond reason, and had no amends to make. It is only when an elephant is sorry for what it has done and realizes that it has committed an infraction of rules that any sort of punishment is accepted. Then, a scolding by the boss of the elephant herd and a few blows of a bull-hook, hardly even comparable to the spanking of a child, are more efficacious than all the tortures in the world. I once saw a big elephant start to lead a rampage in the Coliseum in Chicago, only to be halted by the timely arrival of a favorite keeper.
“Knees!” shouted the attendant, while a crowd of circus visitors gathered to see the “punishment.” The elephant obeyed. The bull-keeper shook his hook.
“Now ain’t you ashamed of yourself!” he began. “Ain’t you ashamed of yourself! A great big lummix like you that ain’t got no more sense than to start a breakaway in a building like this! I’m offen you for life—yes, sir, offen you! Wouldn’t have nothin’ more to do with you if it was the last breath of my life. A great big boob like you! See this?” He shook the hook again. “I got a notion to whale the tar outen you! Just what I’ve got! A great big simp that ain’t got any more sense’n— Well, what’ve you got to say for yourself?”
Perhaps, it was the change of tone more than the words. The elephant raised his trunk and began to coax and whine, for all the world as though he were telling his side of the story. For a full ten minutes it continued, the animal man announcing his displeasure, the elephant pleading. At the end he asked:
“Well, do you think you can be good now?”
Up and down, up and down in an excited affirmative came the answer, as the elephant bobbed his head, not once, but a dozen times. The attendant grinned.