But few stories are quite as wonderful as that one. We have no difficulty at all in believing the account of the Elephant who took care of a little child. He did not wear a cap and apron, as the artist has shown in the picture, but he certainly was a very kind and attentive nurse. When the child fell down, the Elephant would put his trunk gently around it, and pick it up. When it got tangled among thorns or vines, the great nurse would disengage it as carefully as any one could have done it; and when it wandered too far, the Elephant would bring it back and make it play within proper limits. I do not know what would have been the consequence if this child had behaved badly, and the Elephant had thought fit to give it a box on the ear. But nothing of the kind ever happened, and the child was a great deal safer than it would have been with many ordinary nurses.
There are so many stories told about the Elephant that I can allude to but few, even if I did not believe that you were familiar with a great many of them.
One of the most humane and thoughtful Elephants of whom I have ever heard was one which was attached, like our friend Kudabar, to an artillery train in India. He was walking, on a march, behind a wagon, when he perceived a soldier slip down in the road and fall exactly where, in another instant, the hind-wheel of the wagon would pass over him. Without being ordered, the Elephant seized the wheel with his trunk, lifted it—wagon and all—in the air, and held it up until it had passed over the fallen soldier!
Neither you nor I could have done better than that, even if we had been strong enough.
A very pretty story is told of an Indian Elephant who was very gallant. His master, a young Burman lord, had recently been married, and, shortly after the wedding, he and his bride, with many of their guests and followers, were gathered together in the veranda, on the outside of his house. The Elephant, who was a great favorite with the young lord, happened to be conducted past the house as the company were thus enjoying themselves. Feeling, no doubt, that it was right to be as polite as possible on this occasion, he put his trunk over a bamboo-fence which enclosed a garden, and selecting the biggest and brightest flower he could see, he approached the veranda, and rearing himself upon his hind-legs, he stretched out his trunk, with the flower held delicately in the little finger at its end, towards the company. One of the women reached out her hand for it, but the Elephant would not give it to her. Then his master wished to take it, but the Elephant would not let him have it. But when the newly-made bride came forward the Elephant presented it to her with all the grace of which he was capable!