Kari the elephant

by Dhan Gopal Mukerji

You do not know what music can do for animals. If you took a flute and played certain tunes on it, all of the snakes would come out of their holes and dance to the music! There is supposed to be a kind of flower, like a sensitive plant, that can be put to sleep by the playing of a very delicate tune. I have seen with my own eyes how fond the deer are of music. Sometimes in the middle of the afternoon, if you stand on the edge of the forest and play your flute and slowly strike the notes which sound like the whistling call of the antelope, you will see a strange phenomenon. The deer generally bark, but they also give a whistling call.

IF YOU TOOK A FLUTE AND PLAYED CERTAIN TUNES ON IT, ALL OF THE SNAKES WOULD COME OUT OF THEIR HOLES AND DANCE TO THE MUSIC

As I was playing my flute one afternoon, I remember distinctly that nothing happened for a while. I stopped and tried another tune. I heard a strange rustle in the leaves of the small plants of the jungle; but nothing came of it. Again I changed my tune and played on. This time even the leaves did not move, so I was sure my flute was not catching the ear of any animal. I was heart-broken. I had gone to test my knowledge of flute-playing, but I found out that I could not attract any animal.

It was getting late; the darkness of the jungle became thicker and thicker, though the April sun was still scorching the open meadow. At last in desperation, I tried my only remaining tune, not being very proficient on the flute. For a while nothing happened. I played so intently that I paid attention to nothing else and was greatly startled to hear a noise as if someone were pulling on a rope. I looked up and there was a stag whose nostrils were quivering with excitement as if he scented the music. His beautiful forked horns were caught up in a creeper hanging from a tree, from which he was trying to free himself. I kept on playing, but did not take my eyes from him. At last he freed himself from the vine, but a tendril still clung to his horns like a crown of green. He came nearer and stood still.

I kept on playing, and one by one more golden faces began to come out from behind the foliage of the jungle. The spotted fawn, the musk-deer, gazelles and antelopes, all seemed to answer the call of the music. I stopped playing. That instant a shiver went through the herd; the stag stamped his foot on the ground and as swiftly as the waving of a blade of grass in the breeze they all disappeared in the forest. I could feel in the distance the shiver of the undergrowth of grass and saplings indicating the way the animals had passed.

Knowing this power of music over animals, I wanted to train Kari and Kopee to follow the tunes of my flute. Kopee was such a monkey that I could not make him listen. Whenever I began to play the flute, he would go to sleep or run up a tree. Monkeys have no brains.

Kari, on the contrary, though much worse at first, was more sensible. He paid no attention to any tune that I played, but once in a while, I would strike a note that would make him stop still and listen, and I could tell by his manner that this tune went home. Those long fanning ears of his would stop waving and the restless trunk would be still for a moment. Unfortunately, the notes that really reached his soul were very few—I could hardly sustain them for more than a minute and a half. Weeks passed before I could get them back again.

One day after the battle with the wild elephant in the jungle, I took up the flute again and began to play for him. I tried many notes and chords. At last I could sustain the tones he liked for more than three minutes. By the end of August, I could make Kari listen to my music for ten minutes at a time. When another winter had passed and summer came again, I could really command him with my music. I could sit on his back, almost on his neck, and play the flute, never saying a word, and guide him for days and days.