At last, by vigorous work with the elephant hooks, Alice was turned and headed out of the building. A foot at a time she passed out, then headed toward the bear dens. Midway, we steered her in among some young maple trees, and soon had her front legs chained to one of them. Alice tried to push it over, and came near to doing so.
Then we quickly tied her hind legs together,—and she was all ours. Seeing that all was clear for a fall, we joyously pushed Alice off her feet. She went over, and fell prone upon her side. In three minutes all her feet were securely anchored to trees, and we sat down upon her prostrate body.
At that crowning indignity Alice was the maddest elephant in the world for that day. We gave her food, and the use of her trunk, and left her there twenty-four hours, to think it over. She deserved a vast beating with canes; but we gave her no punishment whatever. It would have served no good purpose.
During the interval we telephoned to Coney Island, and asked Dick
Richards, the former keeper of Alice, to come and reason with her.
Promptly he came,—and he is still guiding as best he can the
checkered destinies of that erring female.
When Alice was unwound and permitted to arise,—with certain limitations as to her progress through the world,—it was evident that she was in a chastened mood. She quietly marched to her quarters at the Antelope House, and there we interned her. But that was not all of Alice. Very soon we had to move her to the completed Elephant House, half a mile away. Keeper Richards said that two or three times she had bolted into buildings at Luna Park; so we prepared to overcome her idiosyncrasies by a combination of force and strategy. I had the men procure a strong rope about one hundred feet long, in the middle of which I had them fix a very nice steel hook, large enough to hook suddenly around a post or a tree.
One end of that rope we tied to the left foot of Charming Alice, and the remainder of the rope was carried out at full length in front of her.
Willingly enough she started from the Antelope House, and Richards led her about three hundred feet. Then she stopped, and disregarding all advice and hooks, started to come about, to return to the Antelope House. Quickly the anchor was hooked around the nearest fence post, and Alice fetched up against a force stronger than herself. She was greatly annoyed, but in a few minutes decided to go on.
Another lap of two hundred feet, and the same act was repeated, without the slightest variation.
This process continued for nearly half a mile. By that time we were opposite the Elk House and Alice had become wild with baffled rage. She tried hard to smash fences and uproot trees.
At last she stood still and refused to move another foot; and then we played our ace of trumps. Near by, twenty laborers were working. Calling all hands, they took hold of that outstretched rope, and heading straight for the new Elephant House started a new tug of war. Every "heave-ho" of that hilarious company meant a three-foot step forward for Gentle Alice,—willy-nilly. As she raged and roared, the men heaved and laughed. A yard at a time they pulled that fatal left foot, into the corral and into the apartment of Alice; and she had to follow it.