The Van Buren press., 1896-05-09
ELEPHANT WORKERS.
An Occupation That Engages the Huge
Animal Mt Eangoon.

Animal MT kianEoon.
We had seen many elephants during
our Indian journey, and in a variety of
occupations, from the temple elephants
engaged in their solemn and sleepy
professions to the huge and we'll
groomed animals belonging to the
artillery batteries at Quetta and
Peshawur, on the Afghan frontier, and
we listened to not few tales of what
they could do, sometimes with just a
shade of ineredulity.
There are about dozen elephants en-
ployed in the work of the yard, and all
of these but one are males. This may,
and probably does, arise from the fact
that the males are usually larger and
stronger than the female elephants, but,
Judging from the specimen we saw, it
cannot be from any superiority of intel
ligence on the part of the female ami
NAL. The solitary female worker, in
deed, is a yeritable maid-of-all-w
about the yard, and no kind Of work
appears TO come amiss to her. At one
time she may be seen holding log up
~ lut SIM w utll ~ W YIN. titiitl thtiNiS'
~ across, as occasion may require; at
another she is dragging the slabs away
with the end of her trunk, and piling
them in heaps with all the regularity
and skill of the most neat-handed work.
man; at third she is making stack
of the sawn boards, or sweeping the
sawdust from the millhouse floor with
gigantic broom. The meaning of the
whistle to knock off work is not better
known to any workmen on the place
than to her, and it is no easy matter to
induce her to do a single trunks turn
when the signal has once sounded.
The log, once piloted to shore, will,
at the word of command, if not of q
greater weight than about ton and a
half, be priced up by the animals tusk,
and then grasped with trunk carefully
and exactly in the middle, and carried
to the spot where it is wanted. Arrived
at the heap of logs in the yard, he will
place one end on the ground and the
other on the heap, and then proceed
with the most systematic care to push
it up and adjust it with the point of his
tusls,
You cannotoverload an elephant, how
ever, for the animal will at once refuse
any load which he considers beyond his
strength, and there is practically no APP
peal from an elephants opinion on such
question. M case of log being
brought ashore which seems too large
and heavy for single elephant, a sec
ond is called to his assistance, and the
two animals proceed quickly to pick it
up by the extreme ends and carry it to
the required heap, where they deposit
it with the utmost care, even eXamin-
ing it critically to see that it is perfect
ly in line with the rest of the stack. For
this and all other nice processes of adj
iustment the point of the tnsk is the in
strument used.
1t has been said that an elephant can
do everything but speak, and, indeed
we were often disposed TO doubt whether
there was even this exception. What
ever emotion one of these animals feels
he seems ready to express in sound, and
so various are the modulations of his
voice, and SO ready their sympathy and
apparent comprehension of one an
other, that we could hardly doubt that
the impression that elephants cannot
was due rather to our ignorance than *
their want of the power Of making
! themselves understood. The clephan
is very liable to sunstrokc, especially
when working in the water, and even on
shore he is generally furnished with q
cover for his head during the hours OF
the greatest heat. A good elephant is
of such value that his health is not to
be risked lightly, and, indeed, after we
had seen what they could do, VIC
were inclined to go further, and say
that well-trained elephant is absolute
ly invaluable for heavy labor in a eli
mate such as that in which he finds his
natural -lIarper's Weekly.