The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1904-07-08
WHITE ELEPHANTS SCARCE.
ONLY FOUR OF THE SACRED
BEASTS IN SLAMS STABLES.


They Are Kept in Great HaIIs-once
Each Year They Take Part In State
Professions, Arrayed in Gorgeous
Trappings.
From Bangkok, Siam, Eliza r. Scid-
more writes to a Ch cago paper hat
there is no guide book to Bangkok,
no map or plan Of the city to be
bought, and no regular book store to
buy one in. If one wants guide the
hotel people think minute, and then
agree to find some one who knows
the way around; or one goes to his
Consul, who can always send for a
Chinese or Siamese who has shown
strangers the city's lions after fash
ion.
Through the consulate one gets
permission to see the great temple
within the palace precincts, the Wat
Phra Kao, where the famous emerald
Buddha is enshrined, and at the same
time one sees the four white ele-
plants now in the Kings stable
probably the last of their line.
After the dust and noise and I'M
tidy houses, and general offensive
ness Of the Chinese quarter, the City
of the King, with broad streets and
spaces, gardens of shrubbery and
whitewashed walls, comes to one as
glimpse OF paradise. One dismounts
at a fantastic, spired gateway in the
immaculate white wall of the palace
and passes into the great outer court
"a lawn on one side, the buildings
of the Ministers of the lnte-lJf Of
the Foreign Office and the Treasury
on the other.
Young trees. clipped and trained
like the stored umbrellas of priests
and royalty. stand along the pathway,
and on one Of the stone tagged inner
courts are the stables of the sacred
animals, who have given name an !
coat of arms, symbol and standard to
Siam.
We all know now that one shall not
find the white" elephant really
white-as white as a white rat.
white fox or white polar bear. The
four white" elephants now in at
tendance at the palace are a good
mouse color-as gray as Maltese
cat, perhaps, shading to pinkish
flesh color at the ends of the ears,
where they are spsckled and freck.ed
as If with some skin disorder.
Each beast occupies great,
roomy vaulted hall to itself; each one
stands on square pedestal or plat
form, and each one that l saw was
tethered by one, two or three legs.
according to his disposition, to as
many stout posts sunk in the floor.
The first elephant We came to was
tied fast by three feet. He swung
his trunk and rested from one foot
to the other in an unpleasant way.
The keeper crawled out of his
sleepy corner and gave bunch of
green fodder to the elephant, and the
animal turned its small, yellow, wall
eye more amiably to the light.
The next elephant was the same
spotty, leprous looking creature, but
more peaceful in disposition, and the
third one was the best looking of all.
This pretty Maltese gray beast tossed
its trunk in salute and banged its
forehead loudly, and several punches
of greens went to it in reward.
The fourth and last elephant in line
was warranted most savage and vic
ious of ALL and long distance look
from the doorway was enough. for
the elephant was swinging his trunk
and fidgetting from one foot to an
other and the keeper had a wild eye
and the look of one drugged to a
dangerous point.
The stables are c.ean and we'll
kept, spacious and airy, and the ami
mails are carefully tended and fed.
exercised within the palace grounds.
and rarely, more rarely each year,
given part in state professions.
The elephant, and especially the
white elephant, being sacred to Bud
dha, was held in the greatest rever-
ence in all these Buddhist provinces
and petty kingdoms of further India,
and their possession was matter of
great pride and rivalry. Now that
the other kingdoms have fallen and
gone, and only in Siam does a native
dynasty and a Buddhist believer rule,
the sacred white animal makes his
last stand here.
The last addition to the royal
stables was made five years ago,
when faded and speckled elephant
was found in the Laos country, in
the north, and brought down to Bang.
kok in great state and received with
all the time honored ceremonies by
the King. clergy and all the court fol-
lowing.