Amador ledger., 1905-11-24
DANGEROUS CALLING.
POSITION OF ELEPHANT MAN IN
CIRCUS UNDESIRABLE.
He Lives in State of Constant Uneas-
mess and Almost Invariably Is
Killed by His Treacher-
GUS Charge.

perhaps the most dangerous, con-
stantly dangerous business in the world
is the one into which have been tossed
the business of elephant man with
circus" said menagerie employe.
There is a constant demand for bull
men, but few will accept the position,
and most of us fell into the business by
accident, and, showing talent or reck
less disregard for consequences, made
a success in handling the animals, and
have since been classed as bull men,
and offered that job and no other.
Despite the perils, the constant
watchfulness, the half-conscious realiza-
tion that death is near, probably not an
elephant man in the world to-day would
leave his strange calling. 1t has a fas-
cination of a strange kind, and the keep
er becomes attached to the great brutes
that tremble at his word one instant
and the next may turn upon him and
trample him.
Good elephant men command good
pay.
Most of them live in state of con-
slant watchfulness, realizing the
treacherous nature of the brutes, and
those who do not realize this sooner or
later are trampled or hurled to death.
''The elephant is the most treacher-
Gus, moody, changeable animal in a
menagerie. They are twice as danger
GUS as tigers lions or bears. The men
who handle the big cats in their cages
are forced to watch closely and carefully
while they are in the cages with them,
but that lasts only short time.
I'VE bull men live with our gigantic
pets, sleep near them, ride them, order
them around, enter with them into
closed cars for long rides. We are not
afraid of them. Before many years we
become fatalists. We expect them to
kill us some day, but hope it may not be
soon, just as the ordinary citizen expects
death some day
Trainers testify that the elephant
brain works nearer like that of
human being than the brain of any other
animal. The moods and tempers of the
big brutes change suddenly. The
weather, hard night ride on the cars,
bruised foot may turn the best natured
elephant into peevish brute, ready to
strike and murder in an instant. But
these moods pass quickly. The great
danger is when an elephant is just turn
ing into rogue. Every elephant turns
"ogue sooner or later, and they never
recover. They may be tractable for a
time after quieting down, but the attack
will return, and then probably keeper
will be killed. The female elephants
turn rogues earlier and are more violent
than the males, and the females are the
more dangerous in ordinary times.
Elephants form great attachments
for certain men and bitter hatreds TO,
others, hatred that means murder
when the opportunity arrives. But the
love of an elephant for its keeper will
not deter it from killing him when the
outbreak comes.
There was one notorious elephant
who travelled with a score of circuses
under different names, and was finally
executed, who loved one man, friend
Of mine, as never. maiden loved him
She would do anything for him. He
drank. She cared for him and drove
away everyone who tried to come near
when he was drunk and asleep under
her feet. He was discharged from sew
eral circuses, and each time took the
elephant. No one else being able to
handle her, the owners of the shows uD-
derstood that to discharge him was to
lose the beast, and tacitly she became
his property. But she in one rampage
trampled him until he is cripple for
life, and she killed one of the rescuers,
defending fiercely the man she had
crushed.
Good elephant men, ones who can
train the animals, command big sal
aries. One whom l know receives $3.50
a week, but the ordinary bull man. re.
cruited from among the canvas hands
or laborers who have no fear, receive
small salaries and accept the positions
because the work is easier, being willing
to risk their lives to escape hard work.
These men, of course, are under COM
petent trainers"