“Not a bit,” said Dick, with rather a forced smile, for his position was awkward, and he began to think of what might happen if the elephant held on and suddenly rose to its feet.
“Why don’t you make him leave go?” cried the sergeant angrily.
“Thy servant is trying, sahib,” whimpered the man, who jumped on the elephant again, but only brought forth a grunt.
“Shout at him; he understands you.”
“Yes, sahib; but he is in one of his bad tempers this morning.”
The man stepped forward and stamped with one foot on the beast’s neck, and then kicked at his ear.
“That does no good. Where’s your spiked hook?”
“It is not here, O sahib,” whimpered the man, who then burst out with a furious tirade of vituperation; but the offending beast only twitched its contemptible little tail and winked good-humouredly at Dick.
“Oh, vile, pig-headed brother of a mugger!” shrieked the man, while all his fellows stopped short and watched the encounter; “am I to curse thee till thou dost shrivel up into a chicken maggot? Am I to cease cleaning thy dirty hide, and leave thee to be eaten up by wicked flies?”
The elephant “chuntered,” as a north-country man might say, and its meaning seemed to be, “Oh, yes, if you like.”