Kari the Elephant Part 4

This summer a very daring tiger visited our village. His head looked like a tower and his body was as large as that of an ox.

At first he came in the night and killed oxen or buffaloes, but one night he killed a man, and after that he never killed anything but men, for the tiger is as fond of human meat as we are of chicken.

Our house was very near the jungle; all our windows were barred with iron. Nothing could go in or out through them except mosquitoes or flies. One evening I was sitting at my window at about eight o'clock. I heard the cry of the Fayu, the fox which goes ahead of the tiger, giving the warning call to all the other animals. Then, as the darkness that night was not very intense, I could see the fox go by. Soon I could actually inhale the odor of a tiger.

In a few moments an enormous black creature came and stood in front of the window. As he sat down, the call of the fox in the distance stopped. After a while the tiger stood up and walked toward the window. That instant, the fox in the distance began to call. I was very frightened, but as I wanted to see the tiger clearly, I lit a match. He was so frightened by the sight of fire that with one growl he bounded off.

After that the tiger took to coming early in the afternoons. One day about four o'clock, we saw him standing on a rock across the river, looking at the village. The river was very shallow, hardly five inches deep, but it was very broad and full of sand bars. He stood looking at the village and growling with great joy. In India the government does not allow the people to carry rifles of any sort, so whenever a tiger or a leopard makes a nuisance of himself around the village you generally have to send for a British official to come and kill him. Word was sent to the magistrate of our district. In a few days a chubby-faced Englishman appeared. In the Indian sun the red face of the Westerner looks even redder.

There are certain rules by which men hunt in India. You never shoot an animal weaker than yourself, and if you want to shoot a tiger or a leopard, you give it a warning. If you do not do so, you generally pay for it. After the British official appeared, I was allowed to take him on my elephant and go out in the open to show him that Kari was fit for hunting. He fired a number of shots and killed several birds. Kari, who had never heard a shot before, and whom everyone expected to be frightened, did not pay the slightest attention to all the clamor of flying bullets. He knew at heart he was the master of the jungle, and hence nothing could surprise him. It is said in India that the mark of a gentleman is that he is never surprised. That shows that Kari's ancestors were undoubtedly very gentle elephants.

After killing some more birds, the magistrate became quite convinced that Kari would do for the hunt, so one morning about four o'clock we started out. I sat almost on the neck of my elephant playing my flute, and the magistrate sat in the _howdah_ which had been especially prepared for him, since he was not accustomed to riding elephants any other way. We crossed the river and went far into the jungle. Beaters had gone ahead in large groups to stir up the jungle from all directions. It was very difficult to go through the jungle with the _howdah_ on the elephant's back, and we had to edge our way along between branches and trees.

After riding for at least two hours, we came to an open s.p.a.ce and it was agreed that the beaters should drive all the animals to this clearing. This morning the sunrise was full of noise and without any of the soft and delicate silences which usually mark day-break in the jungle. I felt quite out of humor and apparently Kari was bored to death. He kept on pulling at one twig after another with his trunk, nibbling and wasting everything. Our pa.s.senger did not know any language but English, and as I knew nothing of English at that time, we spoke very little and only by signs.

The first animals to come before us were a herd of antelopes which dashed towards us like burnt gold flashing through emerald water. After they had pa.s.sed, a lull fell on the scene, which was soon broken by the grunt and snort of a rhinoceros. He rushed forward in a straight line, as usual, breaking and tearing everything. Kari averted his gaze because elephants are always irritated by the ostentatious bustle of a rhinoceros. Then, soon after him we saw a horned boar rushing like a black javelin through the air, followed by many animals, weasels and wild cats, and once in a while a cheetah with its spotted skin. They refused to come out in the open, however, but always went behind the screen of foliage and gra.s.s, for they had smelled the danger signal, man and elephant.

Every little while we heard a pa.s.sionate and angry growl. When this sound reached our ears, the magistrate would sit up with his rifle to take aim. Then there would be a lull. Now we could hear the cry of the beaters in the distance coming nearer and nearer.

Suddenly a herd of elephants pa.s.sed. They made no noise and left no trace, but pa.s.sed by like walking cathedrals.

Again the angry growl fell on the jungle, but this time it was ahead of us. The beaters cried out again close by, but all were silenced by the roar of the approaching tiger. With one bound he appeared in the clearing, but immediately disappeared again. We could see him pa.s.sing from one bush to another; and when he stopped we caught a glimpse of his hind legs. Without any warning the magistrate fired and like a thunder bolt, the tiger leaped in front of the elephant with one roar. Kari reared; he walked backwards and stood with his back against a tree. The magistrate could not shoot at the tiger without sending a bullet through my head, so he had to wait.

Then with a leap the tiger was by the side of the elephant, so close to the _howdah_ that there was not the distance of even a rifle between him and the magistrate. I stopped my flute playing to swear at the magistrate. I said, "You brother of a pig; why did you not give him warning before you shot? Who has ever heard of killing an animal without seeing him face to face? Can you kill a tiger by breaking his hind leg with a bullet?"

The man was livid with terror. He had the rifle in his hand but the tiger was reaching over the _howdah_ and stretching out his paw to get him. He did not know what to do. Kari shook himself with all his strength but he could not shake the tiger off. He trumpeted in great pain because the tiger's claws were cutting into his flesh. He raised his trunk, swayed his body and bounded against a tree behind him; but still the tiger could not be shaken off. The nearer the tiger's paw came, the more the magistrate tried to lean against the side of the _howdah_. Pretty soon he moved towards the elephant's rear, and thus reached a corner of the _howdah_ which gave him almost as much s.p.a.ce as the length of a rifle. I saw the eye of the tiger turn first red and then yellow, and heard the terrible snarl which he gives only when he is sure of his prey. The quality of the snarl is such that it paralyzes his victim.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WITHOUT ANY WARNING THE MAGISTRATE FIRED]

Seeing that the Englishman could do nothing and feeling sure that he would be killed, I knew I had to do something. I stopped swearing and with one terrible yell gave the elephant the master call. He went forward and put his trunk around a very thick branch of a tree and pulled it down with a great crash. That instant the tiger looked at the direction from which the noise had come. His head was near me now, and he did not know whether to attack me or go back to his former prey. It seemed as if hours pa.s.sed. I was petrified with terror, yet I knew that if I let my fright get possession of me, I would be killed. So I controlled myself. Kari was now trying to strike the tiger with this trunk, but he could not get at him.

Suddenly I realized that the Englishman not only had the rifle's length between him and the tiger but was raising the rifle to take aim. Knowing this, I took my flute and hit the tiger's knuckles with it. He came toward me with his paw outstretched and caught the shawl which was loosely tied around my waist. I was glad to hear it tear because he had just missed my flesh. That instant I saw the Englishman put the barrel of the rifle into the tiger's ear. All I remembered was hot blood spurting over my face. Kari was running away with all his might and did not stop until he had crossed the clearing and disappeared beyond the trees. He was not hurt, except that his side was torn here and there with superficial wounds. When the beaters came, I made the elephant kneel down. We both got off. The Englishman went to see how big the tiger was while I led Kari in quest of my broken flute. Toward sun-down when they had skinned the tiger, they found its length to be nine feet, not counting the tail.

CHAPTER VIII

KARI AND THE QUICK-SAND

Though elephants are very unselfish animals, they behave like human beings when brought to the last extremity. The following adventure will show you what I mean.

One day, Kari and Kopee and I went to the river bank to help pull a big barge up the river. The towmen could not pull the ropes hard enough to make progress against the current. All that they could do was to stand still without getting ahead at all. So word was sent on to us and we three went to help out. I harnessed Kari with the tow rope. It was very amusing, as he had never pulled a weight in his life. At first he pulled very hard. The rope almost broke and the barge swayed in the water, almost toppled, and then drifted to its previous position. The swift current was going against it and the people in the barge were shaking their hands and swearing at us as they were afraid that the vessel would capsize.

Kari did not care. After he had pulled the barge about two hundred yards he stopped; the rope slackened and then the current pulled against us. The rope became taut again and the men shrieked from the barge. When you tug a boat, you must not jerk at the rope but pull it gently, so I urged Kari to pull it smoothly. In the course of an hour, he had actually drawn the boat in, and at the end of our journey he had learned to pull evenly.

After that we went on playing on the river bank. Kopee jumped off the elephant's back and ran along the sh.o.r.e. I urged Kari to follow him, and as we kept on going, I lost all sense of direction and trusted to the intelligence of the animals. The monkey, however, had led us into a trap. We had run into quick-sand and Kari began to sink. Every time he tried to lift his feet he seemed to go deeper into the mud and he was so frightened that he tried to take hold of the monkey with his trunk and step on him as something solid, but Kopee chattered and rushed up a tree.

Then Kari swung his trunk around, pulled down the mattress from his back, and putting it on the ground tried to step on it. That did not help, so he curled up his trunk behind to try to get me to step on. Each time he made an effort like that, however, he sank deeper into the mud. I saw the trunk curling back and creeping up to me like a python crawling up a hillside to coil around its prey. There was no more trumpeting or calling from the elephant, but a sinister silence through which he was trying to reach me. He had come to the end of his unselfishness. In order to save himself, he was willing to step on me.

The monkey screamed from the tree-top and I, jumping off the elephant's back, fell on the ground and ran. Kari kept on trumpeting and calling for help, and by this time he was chest deep in the mud. The rear of him had not sunk so far, so he was on a slant which made it all the more difficult for him to lift himself.

I ran off to the village and called for help. By the time we got back with ropes and planks, he was holding his trunk up in order to breathe, as the mud was up to his chin. There was only one thing to do, and that was to lift Kari by his own weight, so we tied the rope to the tree and flung it to him. He got it with his trunk and pulled. The rope throbbed and sang like an electric wire and the tree groaned with the tension, but all that happened was that the elephant slipped forward a little and his hind legs fell deeper into the mud.

Now he was perfectly flat in quick-sand. But something very interesting had taken place. Now that he was holding on to the rope with all his mortal strength we knew that he would not let go of it, so it was easy to go near him and put planks under him, as the hind part of his belly had not yet sunk to the level of the mud. At last he stopped sinking, but as we could not put the planks under his feet it only meant that he would not go further down and smother to death.

Now that his head was lifted and there was an opening between him and the mud, the question was how to lift the front part of his body so that he could drag the rest of it out. Another elephant had to be called in. It turned out to be Kari's mother who had been given to the neighboring king. By the time she arrived, however, dusk had fallen and nothing could be done. We trusted to G.o.d and left him to his quick-sand for the night.

The next morning we found Kari in the same position as the previous evening. He had relaxed his hold on the rope but had not sunk deeper. We had to put more planks all around him but he now knew that he should not attack anyone because we were trying to save him. After the planks had been tested, his mother went up to him. She put her trunk around his neck and started to lift him, but he groaned with pain for he was being smothered. He began to sink again and we just had time to put some more planks between his chest and the mud.

We had also slipped a rope under him, which some men in a boat near the river bank came up and threw over his back. The hawser was made into a loop around his body and the other end was tied around the mother. Then she pulled with all her might, and her strength was so great that his fore-quarters were lifted up and his small legs dangled in the air. He was pulled forward quite a distance, when the hawser broke and his fore-legs fell on the plank. His hind legs now were sinking and we were terribly frightened. We felt as if we had lost him again.

The situation was not so bad as we thought, however, as it was very easy to slip another hawser under him. This time we made a double loop around him, and also made him hold on to the rope around the tree with his trunk. He was very tired, but I urged him to obey me. And now with the aid of his mother, he managed to lift the rear half of his body and put first one leg and then the other on the plank. A great shout of joy went through the crowd as Kari walked on to solid ground. That instant the monkey jumped down from the tree and fell on Kari's neck; he was very glad to see his friend safe again. But Kari was in no humor for anyone's caresses and he shook Kopee off. The first thing I did was to pull some branches from a tree which Kari devoured hungrily. A hungry elephant is not to be bothered by anyone.

I had learned my lesson. I would no longer take my elephant anywhere and everywhere at the behest of the monkey, for monkeys have no judgment.

CHAPTER IX

KARI'S TRAVELS

Sometimes Kari was used for travel. He and I went through many distant places in India with camel caravans, carrying loads of silver and gold, spices and fruits. They went from one end of India to the other, pa.s.sing through hot and deserted cities while our accustomed way when not in their company led through populous places and thick jungle regions. Elephants have an advantage over camels in this respect--gangs of robbers may attack a camel and his driver and rob him, but no one dares to attack an elephant.

As the animals of the jungle do not care to touch an elephant, neither do wild men in desolate places. For this reason they generally used Kari when they wanted to send pearls and other jewels from one place to another.

Once, we were given the king's emerald to carry. It was as big as the morning star, and burned when the glow of the noon-day sun was upon it. Two epics were carved on it--on one side was the story of the heroes, and on the other the story of the G.o.ds. We left the city and pa.s.sed into the jungle. Night came on apace and we stopped.

That night I watched the jungle as I had never watched it before.

It was about nine o'clock; everything was dark and the stars were right on the tips of the trees. Below us in the foliage the eyes of the jungle were looking upon us. Wherever I turned, I thought I saw eyes. Kari swayed slightly from side to side and fell into a doze. The first thing that I noticed was the faint call of a night bird. When that died down, the hooting owl took it up. Then it pa.s.sed into the soft wings of the bats and came into the leaves, and you could feel that noise shimmering down the trees like water in a dream till, with gentle undulations, it disappeared into the ground. The wild boar could be heard grazing. Then there was silence again.

Out of the blackness then came the green eyes of the wild cat below me and, as my eyes became more accustomed to the darkness, I saw small, beaver-like animals burrowing their way through leaves and brushes. I thought I saw weasels way below, and in the distance I felt the stag disturbing the leaves of small plants. Then there was a snarl in the jungle and these gently moving sounds and quivers ceased. An aching silence came over everything, broken only by strange insect voices like the spurting of water. Very soon the call of the fox was heard, and then the groan of the tiger, but that pa.s.sed. As I was above the ground the odor of my breath went up in the air, and the animals never knew there was man about. Men always disturb animals because they hate and fear more than the animals.

Little by little the sounds died down and stillness took possession of the jungle. I saw herds of elephants go into the water to bathe. They did not make the slightest sound; their bodies sank into the water as clouds dip into the sunset. I could see them curling their trunks around their mates and plucking lilies from the water to eat. As the moon with its shadowy light had risen, I seemed to be looking at them through a veil of water. Close to the sh.o.r.e were the little ones stepping into the water and learning how to breathe quant.i.ties of water into their trunks and then snort it out slowly without the slightest sound.

Soon their bath was over, but the only way you could tell that they had bathed was by hearing drops of water like twinkling stars fall from their wet bodies and strike the leaves on the ground.

This proved too much for Kari; he wanted to follow them. I had a hard time keeping him away from the herd, and despite all my urging, he ran right into the river. His mattress and everything that was tied to his back was wet through and through and I had to swim ash.o.r.e. If the emerald had not been tied to my neck, it would have been lost in the water. I went up a tree and waited for Kari to come out of the water.

After I had sat on a branch a little while, I saw two stony eyes watching me. I looked, and looked and looked; a cold shiver ran up and down my back, but I was determined not to fear and hate. I made myself feel very brave and I stared right back into the shining eyes. They closed. In the moonlight I could distinctly see the head of a cobra lying on another branch very near mine. I had disturbed him going up. I knew if I moved a little he would get up and sting me to death, so I sat very still.

Soon there was a terrible hooting and calling in the jungle. I heard hoofs stampeding in the distance. The noise grew louder and louder and I could feel a vast warm tongue licking the cool silence of the night. Then the cobra crawled along the branch to the trunk of the tree, and then on down to the ground. I, who was holding to the trunk, had to sit still while his cold body pa.s.sed over my finger. But I was determined not to fear and I could feel the silken coolness pa.s.sing over my hot hand. In an instant he was gone.

Now I caught sight of Kari snorting before me. As I knew something had taken possession of the jungle, I jumped on his back. While we hurried along we heard the whining snarl of a tiger, not the call of hate or killing, but the call for protection, swiftly following our lead. Being civilized, we instinctively knew the way out of the jungle to human habitation.

We approached the village which was still sleeping in the morning grayness, and behind us saw h.o.r.n.y deer, leopards, and wild cats rushing after us. Then the boars came after us, dashing out of the jungle in terror. Vast clouds of blackness were rising from the horizon, and when the morning light grew more intense, I realized they were clouds of smoke. The morning breeze was warm and in a short time the smell of burning leaves reached me. The forest was on fire.

We arrived at the village in an hour and a half. The sun was already up. The leopards came and sat near the houses as guileless as children; the boars snorted and ran into the rice fields to hide. The tiger came and sat in the open and watched the forest. The antelopes and the deer stood in the ponds and on the banks of the river. By instinct they knew that the water was the only place where the fire could not reach them. We saw flocks of birds flying to shelter. Soon we saw the red tongue of fire licking the gra.s.s and the trees. A terrible heat settled upon the country-side.

I could now go near any animal and touch him. The terrible danger which was common to all had made them forget their relations with each other--that of hunter and prey. Tiger, elephant and man were standing near each other. All had a sense of common friendship, as if the tiger had thrown away his stripes, man his fear, and the deer his sense of danger. We all looked at one another, brothers in a common bond of soul relationship. This sight made me realize why the Hindus believe that each plant and each animal, like man, has a golden thread of spirituality in its soul. In the darkness of the animal's eyes and the eloquence of man's mind it was the same Spirit, the great active Silence moving from life to life.