Chapter VIII: Part I: Stories and Poems of Nature (2)

I held true, aiming behind the shoulder, and my bullet shattered the point or lower end of his heart, taking out a big nick. Instantly the great bear turned with a harsh roar of fury and challenge, blowing the bloody foam from his mouth, so that I saw the gleam of his white fangs; and then he charged straight at me, crashing and bounding through the laurel bushes, so that it was hard to aim. I waited until he came to a fallen tree, raking him as he topped it with a ball which entered his chest and went through the cavity of his body, but he neither swerved nor flinched, and at the moment I did not know that I had struck him. He came steadily on, and in another second was almost upon me. I fired for his forehead, but my bullet went low, entering his open mouth, smashing his lower jaw and going into the neck. I leaped to one side almost as I pulled trigger; and through the hanging smoke the first thing I saw was his paw as he made a vicious side blow at me. The rush of his charge carried him past. As he struck he lurched forward, leaving a pool of bright blood where his muzzle hit the ground; but he recovered himself and made two or three jumps onward, while I hurriedly jammed a couple of cartridges into the magazine, my rifle holding only four, all of which I had fired. Then he tried to pull up, but as he did so his muscles seemed suddenly to give way, his head drooped, and he rolled over and over like a shot rabbit. Each of my first three bullets had inflicted a mortal wound.

It was already twilight, and I merely opened the carcass, and then trotted back to camp. Next morning I returned and with much labor took off the skin. The fur was very fine, the animal being in excellent trim, and unusually bright-colored. Unfortunately, in packing it out I lost the skull, and had to supply its place with one of plaster. The beauty of the trophy, and the memory of the circumstances under which I procured it, make me value it perhaps more highly than any other in my house.

This is the only instance in which I have been regularly charged by a grizzly. On the whole, the danger of hunting these great bears has been much exaggerated. At the beginning of the present century, when white hunters first encountered the grizzly, he was doubtless an exceedingly savage beast, prone to attack without provocation, and a redoubtable foe to persons armed with the clumsy, small-bore, muzzle-loading rifles of the day. But at present, bitter experience has taught him caution. He has been hunted for sport, and hunted for his pelt, and hunted for the bounty, and hunted as a dangerous enemy to stock, until, save in the very wildest districts, he has learned to be more wary than a deer, and to avoid man’s presence almost as carefully as the most timid kind of game. Except in rare cases he will not attack of his own accord, and, as a rule, even when wounded his object is escape rather than battle.

Still, when fairly brought to bay, or when moved by a sudden fit of ungovernable anger, the grizzly is beyond peradventure a very dangerous antagonist. The first shot, if taken at a bear a good distance off and previously unwounded and unharried, is not usually fraught with much danger, the startled animal being at the outset bent merely on flight. It is always hazardous, however, to track a wounded and worried grizzly into thick cover, and the man who habitually follows and kills this chief of American game in dense timber, never abandoning the bloody trail whithersoever it leads, must show no small degree of skill and hardihood, and must not too closely count the risk to life or limb. Bears differ widely in temper, and occasionally one may be found who will not show fight, no matter how much he is bullied; but, as a rule, a hunter must be cautious in meddling with a wounded animal which has retreated into a dense thicket, and has been once or twice roused; and such a beast, when it does turn, will usually charge again and again, and fight to the last with unconquerable ferocity. The short distance at which the bear can be seen through the underbrush, the fury of its charge, and its tenacity of life make it necessary for the hunter on such occasions to have steady nerves and a fairly quick and accurate aim. It is always well to have two men in following a wounded bear under such conditions. This is not necessary, however, and a good hunter, rather than lose his quarry, will, under ordinary circumstances, follow and attack it, no matter how tangled the fastness in which it has sought refuge; but he must act warily and with the utmost caution and resolution, if he wishes to escape a terrible and probably fatal mauling. An experienced hunter is rarely rash, and never heedless; he will not, when alone, follow a wounded bear into a thicket, if by the exercise of patience, skill, and knowledge of the game’s habits he can avoid the necessity; but it is idle to talk of the feat as something which ought in no case to be attempted. While danger ought never to be needlessly incurred, it is yet true that the keenest zest in sport comes from its presence, and from the consequent exercise of the qualities necessary to overcome it. The most thrilling moments of an American hunter’s life are those in which, with every sense on the alert, and with nerves strung to the highest point, he is following alone into the heart of its forest fastness the fresh and bloody footprints of an angered grizzly; and no other triumph of American hunting can compare with the victory to be thus gained.

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

=Biography.= Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), twenty-sixth President
of the United States, was born in New York City. As a boy he was of
frail physique, but overcame this handicap by systematic exercise
and outdoor life. He was always interested in natural history, and
at the age of fourteen, when he accompanied his father on a tour up
the Nile, he made a collection of the Egyptian birds to be found in
the Nile valley. This collection is now in the Smithsonian Museum,
Washington, D. C. In 1884, Roosevelt bought two cattle ranches near
Medora, in North Dakota, where for two years he lived and entered
actively into western life and spirit.

In 1909, at the close of his presidency, he conducted an expedition
to Africa, to make a collection of tropical animals and plants.
Expert naturalists accompanied the party, which remained in the
wilderness for a year, and returned with a collection which
scientists pronounce of unusual value for students of natural
history. Most of the specimens are now in the Smithsonian Museum.
Some of the books in which he has recorded his hunting experiences
are: _African Game Trails_, _The Deer Family_, and _The Wilderness
Hunter_, from which “Old Ephraim, the Grizzly Bear” is taken.

Mr. Roosevelt’s last work as an explorer was his journey to South
America. On this journey he penetrated wildernesses rarely explored
by white men, and made many discoveries in the field of South
American animal and vegetable life and in geography.

The vigorous personality of this great American found expression not
only in the life of men and their political and social relations, but
also in his love of the great outdoors and the unbeaten tracks where
life is an adventure, primitive in surroundings, such a life as was
lived by Sir Walter Raleigh and other great seamen and explorers who
were not content with the tameness of the commonplace.

=Discussion.= 1. By what characteristics may the grizzly generally be
distinguished from the black bear? 2. Which of these characteristics
is most fixed? 3. What change has taken place in the habits of the
North American grizzly? 4. Account for this change. 5. Locate the
region in which the author was hunting at the time of the adventure
he narrates. 6. Describe his outfit and tell what must be considered
in providing such a hunting outfit. 7. What moments in the encounter
with the grizzly were most exciting and dangerous? 8. What qualities
must a hunter of such game possess? 9. What conclusions does the
author give as a result of his experience in hunting “this chief of
American game”? 10. What impression of the author do you gain from
this story? 11. Pronounce: species; wariness; harass; lethargic;
capricious; canyon; obliquely; severity; misshapen.

=Phrases=

popular opinion, 15, 14
natural history, 15, 16
specific identity, 15, 21
standing puzzle, 16, 9
superior prowess, 16, 17
stoutly maintains, 16, 21
widely separated individuals, 16, 28
inhabits indifferently, 17, 7
in extreme form, 17, 14
imperfect connecting links, 17, 25
rely on cover, 18, 23
wariness born of fear, 18, 26
lee of a bowlder, 19, 9
wary to a degree, 19, 21
held his own, 19, 23
crabbedly honest, 21, 11
quartering to me, 22, 34
hunted for the bounty, 24, 17
brought to bay, 24, 24
beyond peradventure, 24, 25

MOTI GUJ—MUTINEER

RUDYARD KIPLING

DEESA’S PLAN FOR A VACATION

Once upon a time there was a coffee-planter in India who wished to clear some forest land for coffee-planting. When he had cut down all the trees and burned the underwood, the stumps still remained. Dynamite is expensive and slow fire slow. The happy medium for stump-clearing is the lord of all beasts, who is the elephant. He will either push the stump out of the ground with his tusks, if he has any, or drag it out with ropes. The planter, therefore, hired elephants by ones and twos and threes, and fell to work. The very best of all the elephants belonged to the very worst of all the drivers or mahouts; and this superior beast’s name was Moti Guj. He was the absolute property of his mahout, which would never have been the case under native rule: for Moti Guj was a creature to be desired by kings, and his name, being translated, meant the Pearl Elephant. Because the British government was in the land, Deesa, the mahout, enjoyed his property undisturbed. He was dissipated. When he had made much money through the strength of his elephant, he would get extremely drunk and give Moti Guj a beating with a tent-peg over the tender nails of the forefeet. Moti Guj never trampled the life out of Deesa on these occasions, for he knew that after the beating was over, Deesa would embrace his trunk and weep and call him his love and his life and the liver of his soul, and give him some liquor. Moti Guj was very fond of liquor—arrack for choice, though he would drink palm-tree toddy if nothing better offered. Then Deesa would go to sleep between Moti Guj’s forefeet, and as Deesa generally chose the middle of the public road, and as Moti Guj mounted guard over him, and would not permit horse, foot, or cart to pass by, traffic was congested till Deesa saw fit to wake up.

There was no sleeping in the daytime on the planter’s clearing: the wages were too high to risk. Deesa sat on Moti Guj’s neck and gave him orders, while Moti Guj rooted up the stumps—for he owned a magnificent pair of tusks; or pulled at the end of a rope—for he had a magnificent pair of shoulders—while Deesa kicked him behind the ears and said he was the king of elephants. At evening time Moti Guj would wash down his three hundred pounds’ weight of green food with a quart of arrack, and Deesa would take a share, and sing songs between Moti Guj’s legs till it was time to go to bed. Once a week Deesa led Moti Guj down to the river, and Moti Guj lay on his side luxuriously in the shallows, while Deesa went over him with a coir-swab and a brick. Moti Guj never mistook the pounding blow of the latter for the smack of the former that warned him to get up and turn over on the other side. Then Deesa would look at his feet and examine his eyes, and turn up the fringes of his mighty ears in case of sores or budding ophthalmia. After inspection the two would “come up with a song from the sea,” Moti Guj, all black and shining, weaving a torn tree branch twelve feet long in his trunk, and Deesa knotting up his own long wet hair.

It was a peaceful, well-paid life till Deesa felt the return of the desire to drink deep. He wished for an orgy. The little draughts that led nowhere were taking the manhood out of him.

He went to the planter, and “My mother’s dead,” said he, weeping.

“She died on the last plantation two months ago, and she died once before that when you were working for me last year,” said the planter, who knew something of the ways of nativedom.

“Then it’s my aunt, and she was just the same as a mother to me,” said Deesa, weeping more than ever. “She has left eighteen small children entirely without bread, and it is I who must fill their little stomachs,” said Deesa, beating his head on the floor.

“Who brought you the news?” said the planter.

“The post,” said Deesa.

“There hasn’t been a post here for the past week. Get back to your lines!”

“A devastating sickness has fallen on my village, and all my wives are dying,” yelled Deesa, really in tears this time.

“Call Chihun, who comes from Deesa’s village,” said the planter. “Chihun, has this man got a wife?”

“He?” said Chihun. “No. Not a woman of our village would look at him. They’d sooner marry the elephant.”

Chihun snorted. Deesa wept and bellowed.

“You will get into a difficulty in a minute,” said the planter. “Go back to your work!”

“Now I will speak Heaven’s truth,” gulped Deesa, with an inspiration. “I haven’t been drunk for two months. I desire to depart in order to get properly drunk afar off and distant from this heavenly plantation. Thus I shall cause no trouble.”

A flickering smile crossed the planter’s face. “Deesa,” said he, “you’ve spoken the truth, and I’d give you leave on the spot if anything could be done with Moti Guj while you’re away. You know that he will only obey your orders.”

“May the light of the heavens live forty thousand years. I shall be absent but ten little days. After that, upon my faith and honor and soul, I return. As to the inconsiderable interval, have I the gracious permission of the heaven-born to call up Moti Guj?”

Permission was granted, and in answer to Deesa’s shrill yell, the mighty tusker swung out of the shade of a clump of trees where he had been squirting dust over himself till his master should return.

“Light of my heart, protector of the drunken, mountain of might, give ear!” said Deesa, standing in front of him.

Moti Guj gave ear, and saluted with his trunk. “I am going away,” said Deesa.

Moti Guj’s eyes twinkled. He liked jaunts as well as his master. One could snatch all manner of nice things from the road-side then.

“But you, you fussy old pig, must stay behind and work.”

The twinkle died out as Moti Guj tried to look delighted. He hated stump-hauling on the plantation. It hurt his teeth.

“I shall be gone for ten days, oh, delectable one! Hold up your near forefoot and I’ll impress the fact upon it, warty toad of a dried mud-puddle.” Deesa took a tent-peg and banged Moti Guj ten times on the nails. Moti Guj grunted and shuffled from foot to foot.

“Ten days,” said Deesa, “you will work and haul and root the trees as Chihun here shall order you. Take up Chihun and set him on your neck!” Moti Guj curled the tip of his trunk, Chihun put his foot there, and was swung on to the neck. Deesa handed Chihun the heavy _ankus_—the iron elephant goad.

Chihun thumped Moti Guj’s bald head as a paver thumps a curbstone.

Moti Guj trumpeted.

“Be still, hog of the backwoods! Chihun’s your mahout for ten days. And now bid me good-by, beast after mine own heart. Oh, my lord, my king! Jewel of all created elephants, lily of the herd, preserve your honored health; be virtuous. Adieu!”

Moti Guj lapped his trunk round Deesa and swung him into the air twice. That was his way of bidding him good-by.

“He’ll work now,” said Deesa to the planter. “Have I leave to go?”

The planter nodded, and Deesa dived into the woods. Moti Guj went back to haul stumps.

THE MUTINY

Chihun was very kind to him, but he felt unhappy and forlorn for all that. Chihun gave him a ball of spices, and tickled him under the chin, and Chihun’s little baby cooed to him after work was over, and Chihun’s wife called him a darling; but Moti Guj was a bachelor by instinct, as Deesa was. He did not understand the domestic emotions. He wanted the light of his universe back again—the drink and the drunken slumber, the savage beatings and the savage caresses.

None the less he worked well, and the planter wondered. Deesa had wandered along the roads till he met a marriage procession of his own caste, and, drinking, dancing, and tippling, had drifted with it past all knowledge of the lapse of time.

The morning of the eleventh day dawned, and there returned no Deesa. Moti Guj was loosed from his ropes for the daily stint. He swung clear, looked round, shrugged his shoulders, and began to walk away, as one having business elsewhere.

“Hi! ho! Come back, you!” shouted Chihun. “Come back and put me on your neck, misborn mountain! Return, splendor of the hill-sides! Adornment of all India, heave to, or I’ll bang every toe off your fat forefoot!”

Moti Guj gurgled gently, but did not obey. Chihun ran after him with a rope and caught him up. Moti Guj put his ears forward, and Chihun knew what that meant, though he tried to carry it off with high words.

“None of your nonsense with me,” said he. “To your pickets, devil-son!”

“Hrrump!” said Moti Guj, and that was all—that and the forebent ears.

Moti Guj put his hands in his pockets, chewed a branch for a toothpick, and strolled about the clearing, making fun of the other elephants who had just set to work.

Chihun reported the state of affairs to the planter, who came out with a dog-whip and cracked it furiously. Moti Guj paid the white man the compliment of charging him nearly a quarter of a mile across the clearing and “Hrrumphing” him into his veranda. Then he stood outside the house, chuckling to himself and shaking all over with the fun of it as an elephant will.

“We’ll thrash him,” said the planter. “He shall have the finest thrashing ever elephant received. Give Kala Nag and Nazim twelve foot of chain apiece, and tell them to lay on twenty.”

Kala Nag—which means Black Snake—and Nazim were two of the biggest elephants in the lines, and one of their duties was to administer the graver punishment, since no man can beat an elephant properly.

They took the whipping-chains and rattled them in their trunks as they sidled up to Moti Guj, meaning to hustle him between them. Moti Guj had never, in all his life of thirty-nine years, been whipped, and he did not intend to begin a new experience. So he waited, waving his head from right to left, and measuring the precise spot in Kala Nag’s fat side where a blunt tusk could sink deepest. Kala Nag had no tusks; the chain was the badge of his authority; but for all that, he swung wide of Moti Guj at the last minute, and tried to appear as if he had brought the chain out for amusement. Nazim turned round and went home early. He did not feel fighting fit that morning and so Moti Guj was left standing alone with his ears cocked.

That decided the planter to argue no more, and Moti Guj rolled back to his amateur inspection of the clearing. An elephant who will not work and is not tied up is about as manageable as an eighty-one-ton gun loose in a heavy seaway. He slapped old friends on the back and asked them if the stumps were coming away easily; he talked nonsense concerning labor and the inalienable rights of elephants to a long “nooning”; and, wandering to and fro, he thoroughly demoralized the garden till sundown, when he returned to his-picket for food.

“If you won’t work, you shan’t eat,” said Chihun, angrily. “You’re a wild elephant, and no educated animal at all. Go back to your jungle.”

Chihun’s little brown baby was rolling on the floor of the hut, and stretching out its fat arms to the huge shadow in the doorway. Moti Guj knew well that it was the dearest thing on earth to Chihun. He swung out his trunk with a fascinating crook at the end, and the brown baby threw itself, shouting, upon it. Moti Guj made fast and pulled up till the brown baby was crowing in the air twelve feet above his father’s head.

“Great Lord!” said Chihun. “Flour cakes of the best, twelve in number, two feet across and soaked in rum, shall be yours on the instant, and two hundred pounds weight of fresh-cut young sugar-cane therewith. Deign only to put down safely that insignificant brat who is my heart and my life to me!”

Moti Guj tucked the brown baby comfortably between his forefeet, that could have knocked into toothpicks all Chihun’s hut, and waited for his food. He ate it, and the brown baby crawled away. Moti Guj dozed and thought of Deesa. One of many mysteries connected with the elephant is that his huge body needs less sleep than anything else that lives. Four or five hours in the night suffice—two just before midnight, lying down on one side; two just after one o’clock, lying down on the other. The rest of the silent hours are filled with eating and fidgeting, and long grumbling soliloquies.

At midnight, therefore, Moti Guj strode out of his pickets, for a thought had come to him that Deesa might be lying drunk somewhere in the dark forest with none to look after him. So all that night he chased through the undergrowth, blowing and trumpeting and shaking his ears. He went down to the river and blared across the shallows where Deesa used to wash him, but there was no answer. He could not find Deesa, but he disturbed all the other elephants in the lines, and nearly frightened to death some gypsies in the woods.

At dawn Deesa returned to the plantation. He had been very drunk indeed, and he expected to get into trouble for outstaying his leave. He drew a long breath when he saw that the bungalow and the plantation were still uninjured, for he knew something of Moti Guj’s temper, and reported himself with many lies and salaams. Moti Guj had gone to his pickets for breakfast. The night exercise had made him hungry.

“Call up your beast,” said the planter; and Deesa shouted in the mysterious elephant language that some mahouts believe came from China at the birth of the world, when elephants and not men were masters. Moti Guj heard and came. Elephants do not gallop. They move from places at varying rates of speed. If an elephant wished to catch an express train he could not gallop, but he could catch the train. So Moti Guj was at the planter’s door almost before Chihun noticed that he had left his pickets. He fell into Deesa’s arms, trumpeting with joy, and the man and beast wept and slobbered over each other, and handled each other from head to heel to see that no harm had befallen.

“Now we will get to work,” said Deesa. “Lift me up, my son and my joy!”

Moti Guj swung him up, and the two went to the coffee-clearing to look for difficult stumps.

The planter was too astonished to be very angry.

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

=Biography.= Rudyard Kipling (1865—) was born in Bombay, India, of
British parents. He was sent to England for most of his education,
but at the age of seventeen he returned to India to work as a
journalist. Very soon he began to write tales of the life about him,
as well as poems dealing with British civil officials and soldiers in
India. By the time he was twenty-four he had won fame with his _Plain
Tales from the Hills_ and other short stories; and when he published
_Barrack Room Ballads_, in 1892, he was widely recognized as a great
poet. From 1892 to 1896 he lived in the United States. Perhaps he is
best known to boys and girls as the author of the _Jungle Books_.
He is a master of the art of telling stories, either in prose or
verse. His ballads about the British soldier, “Tommy Atkins,” and
his experiences on the frontiers of civilization, have a ring and a
movement that suggests the old days when the ballad-maker was a man
of action, living the adventures that he celebrated in song.

=Discussion.= 1. Read all that tells you of the time and place in
which this mutiny occurred. 2. Read all that gives you a picture of
life on the clearing. 3. Who is the principal character in the story?
4. What caused the mutiny? 5. What ended it? 6. What is the most
interesting point in the story? 7. Read parts that convince you that
Kipling knows the characteristics of the elephant. 8. Find instances
where he exaggerates the intelligence of the elephant, giving it
human characteristics. 9. Does this add to or take from the interest
of the story? 10. Read parts in which humor is shown in dialogue or
incident. 11. Tell in your own words the main incident. 12. What do
you like about this story? 13. Tell what you know of the author. 14.
Pronounce the following: orgy; draughts; devastating; amateur; deign.

=Phrases=

happy medium, 27, 5
absolute property, 27, 11
the case under native rule, 27, 12
liver of his soul, 27, 22
draughts that led nowhere, 28, 22
ways of nativedom, 28, 27
with an inspiration, 29, 8
inconsiderable interval, 29, 18
mighty tusker, 29, 22
domestic emotions, 30, 26
savage caresses, 30, 28
of his own caste, 30, 31
adornment of all India, 31, 5
forebent ears, 31, 14
badge of his authority, 32, 2
amateur inspection, 32, 8
inalienable rights, 32, 13
fascinating crook, 32, 22
grumbling soliloquies, 33, 3
blared across the shallows, 33, 9

THE ELEPHANTS THAT STRUCK

SAMUEL WHITE BAKER

I remember an occasion many years ago when in Ceylon I, in connection with my brother, had organized a scheme for the development of a mountain sanitarium at Newera Ellia. We had a couple of tame elephants employed in various works; but it was necessary to obtain the assistance of the government stables for the transport of very heavy machinery, which could not be conveyed in the ordinary native carts. There were accordingly a large number of elephant wagons drawn by their colossal teams, some of which required four elephants.

It was the wet season upon the mountains. Our settlement was 6200 feet above the sea, and the zigzag pass from Ramboddé, at the base of the steep ascent, was fifteen miles in length. The crest of the pass was 7000 feet in altitude, from which we descended 800 feet to the Newera Ellia plain.

The elephant wagons having arrived at Ramboddé from Colombo, about 100 miles distant, commenced the heavy uphill journey. The rain was unceasing, the roads were soft, and the heavily laden wagons sank deeply in the ruts; but the elephants were mighty beasts, and, laying their weight against the work, they slowly dragged the vehicles up the yielding and narrow way.

The abrupt zigzags bothered the long wagons and their still longer teams. The bridges over dangerous chasms entailed the necessity of unloading the heavier carts, and caused great delay. Day after day passed away; but although the ascent was slow, the wagons still moved upwards, and the region of everlasting mist (at that season) was reached. Dense forests clothed the mountain sides; the roar of waterfalls resounded in the depths of black ravines; tangled bamboo grass crept upwards from the wet soil into the lower branches of the moss-covered trees, and formed a green curtain impenetrable to sight.

The thermometer fell daily as the altitude increased. The elephants began to sicken; two fine animals died. There was plenty of food, as the bamboo grass was the natural provender, and in the carts was a good supply of paddy; but the elephants’ intelligence was acting against them—they had reasoned, and had become despondent.

For nine or ten days they had been exposed to ceaseless wet and cold, dragging their unmanageable wagons up a road that even in dry weather was insufficient to sustain the weight. The wheels sank deep below the metal foundation, and became hopelessly imbedded. Again and again the wagons had to be emptied of their contents, and extra elephants were taken from other carts and harnessed to the empty wagons, which were by sheer weight of animals dragged from the deep mire.

Thus the time had passed, and the elephants had evidently reasoned upon the situation, and had concluded that there was no summit to the mountain, and no end to the steep and horrible ascent; it would be, therefore, useless to persevere in unavailing efforts. They determined, under these heart-breaking circumstances, to strike work; and they did strike.

One morning a couple of the elephant drivers appeared at my house in Newera Ellia, and described the situation. They declared that it was absolutely impossible to induce the elephants to work; they had given it up as a bad job!

I immediately mounted my horse and rode up the pass, and then descended the road upon the other side, timing the distance by my watch. Rather under two miles from the summit I found the road completely blocked with elephant carts and wagons; the animals were grazing upon bamboo grass in the thick forest; the rain was drizzling, and a thick mist increased the misery of the scene. I ordered four elephants to be harnessed to a cart intended for only one animal. This was quickly effected, and the drivers were soon astride the animals’ necks, and prodded them with the persuasive iron hooks. Not an elephant would exert itself to draw. In vain the drivers, with relentless cruelty, drove the iron points deep into the poor brutes’ necks and heads, and used every threat of their vocabulary; the only response was a kind of “marking time” on the part of the elephants, which simply moved their legs mechanically up and down, and swung their trunks to and fro; but none would pull or exert the slightest power, neither did they move forward a single inch!

I never saw such an instance of passive and determined obstinacy; the case was hopeless.

An idea struck me. I ordered the drivers to detach the four elephants from the harness, and to ride them thus unfettered up the pass, following behind my horse. It appeared to me that if the elephants were heart-broken, and in despair at the apparently interminable mountain pass, it would be advisable to let them know the actual truth, by showing them that they were hardly two miles from the summit, where they would exchange their uphill labor for a descent into Newera Ellia; they should then have an extra feed, with plenty of jaggery (a coarse brown sugar). If they passed an agreeable night, with the best of food and warm quarters, they would possibly return on the following day to their work, and with lighter hearts would put their shoulders to the wheel, instead of yielding to a dogged attitude of despair.

The success of this ruse was perfect. The elephants accompanied me to Newera Ellia, and were well fed and cared for. On the following day we returned to the heavy work, and I myself witnessed their start with the hitherto unyielding wagon. Not only did they exert their full powers, and drag the lumbering load straight up the fatiguing hill without the slightest hesitation, but their example, or some unaccountable communication between them, appeared to give general encouragement. I employed the most willing elephants as extras to each wagon, which they drew to the summit of the pass, and then returned to assist the others—thus completing what had been pronounced by the drivers as utterly impossible. There can be no doubt that the elephants had at once perceived the situation, and in consequence recovered their lost courage.

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

=Biography.= Samuel White Baker (1821-1893) was an English engineer.
At the age of twenty-four he went to Ceylon, where he founded an
agricultural settlement. He soon became known as an explorer and
a hunter of big game. With his wife he explored the region of the
Nile, and later discovered the lake now called Albert Nyanza. His
explorations in this part of central Africa were a part of the
thrilling story of the discovery of the sources of the Nile, and of
the opening of this region to civilization. To know the complete
story of these explorations you should read something about Henry
M. Stanley and David Livingstone. An interesting book covering
explorations in Africa is Bayard Taylor’s _Central Africa_.

Upon his return to England, Baker was greatly honored. He was
knighted and sent to Egypt, where he was commissioned by the Khedive
to suppress the slave traffic and establish regular trade. Later he
explored and hunted in Cyprus, Syria, India, Japan, and the United
States. He is the author of _Wild Beasts and Their Ways_, _The Rifle
and the Hound in Ceylon_, and _True Tales for My Grandsons_, from
which this selection was taken.

=Discussion.= 1. Locate Ceylon on a map. 2. In what work were the
elephants engaged when they became discouraged? 3. Why was the climb
particularly difficult at this season? 4. What ruse was employed? 5.
What success attended the plan? 6. Pronounce: vehicles; chasm; ruse;
fatiguing.

=Phrases=

colossal teams, 35, 8
entailed the necessity, 35, 23
natural provender, 36, 3
intelligence was acting against, 36, 5
by sheer weight, 36, 13
reasoned upon the situation, 36, 16
persuasive iron hooks, 36, 34
marking time, 37, 1
passive obstinacy, 37, 5
unaccountable communication, 37, 27

BIRDS

ROBERT OF LINCOLN

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

Merrily swinging on brier and weed,
Near to the nest of his little dame,
Over the mountain side or mead,
Robert of Lincoln is telling his name:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
Snug and safe is this nest of ours,
Hidden among the summer flowers,
Chee, chee, chee!”

Robert of Lincoln is gayly dressed,
Wearing a bright, black wedding coat;
White are his shoulders, and white his crest,
Hear him call in his merry note:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
Look what a nice new coat is mine;
Sure, there was never a bird so fine.
Chee, chee, chee!”

Robert of Lincoln’s Quaker wife,
Pretty and quiet, with plain brown wings,
Passing at home a patient life,
Broods in the grass while her husband sings:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
Brood, kind creature; you need not fear
Thieves and robbers while I am here.
Chee, chee, chee!”

Modest and shy as a nun is she;
One weak chirp is her only note;
Braggart, and prince of braggarts is he,
Pouring boasts from his little throat:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
Never was I afraid of man,
Catch me, cowardly knaves, if you can.
Chee, chee, chee!”

Six white eggs on a bed of hay,
Flecked with purple, a pretty sight,
There, as the mother sits all day,
Robert is singing with all his might:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
Nice good wife that never goes out,
Keeping house while I frolic about.
Chee, chee, chee!”

Soon as the little ones chip the shell,
Six wide mouths are open for food;
Robert of Lincoln bestirs him well,
Gathering seeds for the hungry brood.
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
This new life is likely to be
Hard for a gay young fellow like me.
Chee, chee, chee!”

Robert of Lincoln at length is made
Sober with work, and silent with care,
Off his holiday garment laid,
Half forgotten that merry air:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
Nobody knows but my mate and I,
Where our nest and our nestlings lie.
Chee, chee, chee!”

Summer wanes; the children are grown;
Fun and frolic no more he knows,
Robert of Lincoln’s a humdrum crone;
Off he flies, and we sing as he goes:
“Bob-o’-link, bob-o’-link,
Spink, spank, spink;
When you can pipe that merry old strain,
Robert of Lincoln, come back again.
Chee, chee, chee!”

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

=Biography.= William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878) was the first great
American poet. He was reared among the rugged Berkshire Hills of
western Massachusetts. Outside the district school, he had little
teaching except that given by his mother and what he gave himself
through the excellent library of his father, who was a country
physician. He grew up in close touch with nature and the simple farm
surroundings, and this lonely life may have tended to make him rather
more serious and thoughtful than most boys of his age. By the time
he was nine years old he was putting his thoughts into verse in the
stately fashion of the English poets of that time. In 1811, when yet
scarcely eighteen, he wrote “Thanatopsis,” now one of the world’s
classics.

By this time he had studied two years at a private school and seven
months at Williams College. He was ambitious to continue his studies
at Yale, but his father’s circumstances compelled him to give up that
hope and to face the immediate problem of earning his own living. He
studied law and was admitted to practice in 1815. After a few years
he went to New York, where in 1825 he became editor of the _Evening
Post_—a position which he continued to fill with distinction for more
than half a century, until his death in 1878.

And yet this busy editor of a great city newspaper found leisure
from time to time to cultivate his love for verse and to continue to
write poetry. His poems were popular with Americans because he chose
for the most part American subjects taken from his own immediate
surroundings and experience—the scenes and impressions of his
boyhood, the flowers, the birds, the hills, the climate of his own
New England.

America’s first men of letters whose writings proved that the new
republic could produce a literature worthy to be compared with that
of the mother country were James Fenimore Cooper, writer of Indian
tales; Washington Irving, writer of legends about America and the
sketches about our old English home; and William Cullen Bryant.
Cooper showed the strangeness and romance of frontier life. Irving
tried to give to America the romantic background that the new country
lacked. Bryant opened men’s eyes to the beauty of nature.

Though Bryant was eleven years younger than Irving, his “Thanatopsis”
was written only two years after Irving’s “Knickerbocker.”

=Note.= The bobolink is an American song bird. In the spring the
male is mostly black and white, while the female is streaked with
yellowish brown. In midsummer the male bobolink molts, taking on
“plain brown” plumage like that of his “Quaker wife.” In the spring
he regains his black and buff colors without molting any feathers.
He sings only in the spring. The bobolink makes long migrations
extending from Canada to Paraguay, and in the late autumn collects in
large flocks which feed in the rice fields of the South, where he is
known as the _ricebird_, or _reedbird_.

=Discussion.= 1. Read the lines that imitate the song of the
bobolink. 2. Describe the dress of Robert of Lincoln and that of his
“Quaker wife.” 3. How does her song differ from his? 4. What are the
work and the care that make him silent? 5. How does the poet account
for the change in his appearance as the season advances? 6. Where
does he go for winter? When will he come again?

=Phrases=

prince of braggarts, 40, 12
chip the shell, 40, 28
bestirs him well, 40, 30
summer wanes, 41, 15
humdrum crone, 41, 17
pipe that merry old strain, 41, 21

THE MARYLAND YELLOW-THROAT

HENRY VAN DYKE

From _Poems of Henry van Dyke_; copyright 1897, 1911, by Charles Scribner’s Sons. By permission of the publishers.

While May bedecks the naked trees
With tassels and embroideries,
And many blue-eyed violets beam
Along the edges of the stream,
I hear a voice that seems to say,
Now near at hand, now far away,
“_Witchery—witchery—witchery!_”

An incantation so serene,
So innocent, befits the scene:
There’s magic in that small bird’s note—
See, there he flits—the Yellow-Throat;
A living sunbeam, tipped with wings,
A spark of light that shines and sings
“_Witchery—witchery—witchery!_”

You prophet with a pleasant name,
If out of Mary-land you came,
You know the way that thither goes
Where Mary’s lovely garden grows;
Fly swiftly back to her, I pray,
And try to call her down this way,
“_Witchery—witchery—witchery!_”

Tell her to leave her cockle-shells,
And all her little silver bells
That blossom into melody,
And all her maids less fair than she.
She does not need these pretty things,
For everywhere she comes, she brings
“_Witchery—witchery—witchery!_”

The woods are greening overhead,
And flowers adorn each mossy bed;
The waters babble as they run—
One thing is lacking, only one:
If Mary were but here today,
I would believe your charming lay,
“_Witchery—witchery—witchery!_”

Along the shady road I look—
Who’s coming now across the brook?
A woodland maid, all robed in white—
The leaves dance round her with delight,
The stream laughs out beneath her feet—,
Sing, merry bird, the charm’s complete,
“_Witchery—witchery—witchery!_”

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

=Biography.= Henry van Dyke (1852-⸺) was born in Germantown, which is
now a part of the city of Philadelphia. When a small boy, his parents
moved to Brooklyn. He was graduated from Princeton College in 1873
and from the Princeton Theological Seminary in 1877. For several
years he was pastor of the Brick Presbyterian Church in New York
City. Later he was made professor of English Literature at Princeton
University, which position he still holds. In 1913 Dr. van Dyke was
appointed United States Minister to Holland, where he lived during
the early years of the World War. He has written many stories and
poems of great literary charm.

=Discussion.= 1. What bird does the poet celebrate in this poem?
2. What pictures does the first stanza give you? 3. What does the
Yellow-Throat seem to say? 4. Make a list of all the names by which
the poet speaks of the bird. 5. What fancy does the poet express in
the third and fourth stanzas? 6. What does the poet say is wanting to
make the day’s charm complete? 7. Which stanza do you like best? 8.
What is the name of the “woodland maid”?

=Phrases=

May bedecks the naked trees, 43, 1
incantation so serene, 43, 8
befits the scene, 43, 9
living sunbeam, 43, 12
you prophet, 43, 15
blossom into melody, 43, 24
the woods are greening, 44, 1
charming lay, 44, 6

THE BELFRY PIGEON

NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS

On the cross-beam under the Old South bell,
The nest of a pigeon is builded well.
In summer and winter, that bird is there,
Out and in with the morning air.

I love to see him track the street
With his wary eye and active feet;
And I often watch him, as he springs,
Circling the steeple with easy wings,
Till across the dial his shade has passed,
And the belfry edge is gained at last.

’Tis a bird I love, with its brooding note,
And the trembling throb in its mottled throat;
There’s a human look in its swelling breast,
And the gentle curve of its lowly crest;
And I often stop with the fear I feel,
He runs so close to the rapid wheel.
Whatever is rung on that noisy bell,
Chime of the hour, or funeral knell,
The dove in the belfry must hear it well.

When the tongue swings out to the midnight moon,
When the sexton cheerily rings for noon,
When the clock strikes clear at morning light,
When the child is waked with “nine at night,”
When the chimes play soft in the Sabbath air,
Filling the spirit with tones of prayer,
Whatever tale in the bell is heard,
He broods on his folded feet unstirred,
Or, rising half in his rounded nest,
He takes the time to smooth his breast;
Then drops again, with filméd eyes,
And sleeps as the last vibration dies.

Sweet bird! I would that I could be
A hermit in the crowd, like thee!
With wings to fly to wood and glen,
Thy lot, like mine, is cast with men;
And, daily, with unwilling feet,
I tread, like thee, the crowded street;
But, unlike me, when day is o’er,
Thou canst dismiss the world, and soar;
Or, at a half-felt wish for rest,
Canst smooth the feathers on thy breast,
And drop, forgetful, to thy nest.

I would that, on such wings of gold,
I could my weary heart upfold;
I would I could look down unmoved
(Unloving as I am unloved),
And while the world throngs on beneath,
Smooth down my cares and calmly breathe;
And, never sad with others’ sadness,
And never glad with others’ gladness,
Listen, unstirred, to knell or chime,
And, lapped in quiet, bide my time.

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

=Biographical and Historical Note.= Nathaniel Parker Willis
(1806-1867) was a native of Portland, Maine, and a graduate of Yale
College. He was born one year earlier than Longfellow, and lived most
of his life in New York City, being one of a small group of writers
known as “The Knickerbockers,” who for many years made New York
the literary center of the country. His father, the Rev. Nathaniel
Willis, established in Boston _The Youth’s Companion._

“Old South” is the name of a church in Boston, in which public
meetings were held at the time of the Revolutionary War. It is now
used as a museum of historic collections.

=Discussion.= 1. What do the first two stanzas tell you about the
bird? 2. Name the various sounds of the bell that the poet mentions.
3. What comparison is found in the fifth stanza? 4. Compare the last
stanza of “The Sandpiper” with the last stanza of this poem and tell
which you like the better. 5. Can you give a reason why the pigeon is
made the hero of this poem?

=Phrases=

track the street, 45, 5
wary eye, 45, 6
easy wings, 45, 8
nine at night, 45, 23
filméd eyes, 46, 3
hermit in the crowd, 46, 6
thy lot is cast with men, 46, 8
with unwilling feet, 46, 9
dismiss the world, 46, 12
half-felt wish for rest, 46, 13
weary heart upfold, 46, 17
throngs on beneath, 46, 20
lapped in quiet, 46, 25
bide my time, 46, 25

THE SANDPIPER

CELIA THAXTER

Across the lonely beach we flit,
One little sandpiper and I;
And fast I gather, bit by bit,
The scattered driftwood, bleached and dry.
The wild waves reach their hands for it,
The wild wind raves, the tide runs high,
As up and down the beach we flit,
One little sandpiper and I.

Above our heads the sullen clouds
Scud, black and swift, across the sky;
Like silent ghosts in misty shrouds
Stand out the white lighthouses high.
Almost as far as eye can reach
I see the close-reefed vessels fly,
As fast we flit along the beach,
One little sandpiper and I.

I watch him as he skims along,
Uttering his sweet and mournful cry:
He starts not at my fitful song,
Nor flash of fluttering drapery.
He has no thought of any wrong,
He scans me with a fearless eye;
Stanch friends are we, well tried and strong,
The little sandpiper and I.

Comrade, where wilt thou be tonight,
When the loosed storm breaks furiously?
My driftwood fire will burn so bright!
To what warm shelter canst thou fly?
I do not fear for thee, though wroth
The tempest rushes through the sky;
For are we not God’s children both,
Thou, little sandpiper, and I?

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

=Biography.= Celia Thaxter (1835-1894), whose father was a lighthouse
keeper on White Island, one of the rocky isles known as the “Isles
of Shoals,” off the coast of New Hampshire, had the ocean for her
companion in her early years. She studied the sunrise and the sunset,
the wild flowers, the birds, the rocks, and all sea life. This
selection shows how intimate was her friendship with the bird life of
the ocean.

=Discussion.= 1. The poet and the sandpiper were comrades; in
the first stanza, what tells you this? 2. Which lines give you a
picture that might be used to illustrate this poem? 3. What common
experiences did the poet and the bird have? 4. Give a quotation from
the poem that describes the sandpiper and his habits. 5. What effect
have the repetitions of the second line of the poem at the end of
the first and second stanzas and the variations of it at the end of
the third and fourth stanzas? 6. Which lines express confidence in
God’s care for His children? 7. What classes of “God’s children” do
“little sandpiper” and “I,” respectively, represent? 8. Pronounce the
following: stanch; loosed; wroth.

=Phrases=

silent ghosts in misty shrouds, 47, 11
close-reefed vessels, 47, 14
my fitful song, 48. 3
flash of fluttering drapery, 48, 4
loosed storm breaks furiously, 48, 10
wroth the tempest rushes, 48, 13

THE THROSTLE

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

“Summer is coming, summer is coming,
I know it, I know it, I know it.
Light again, leaf again, life again, love again!”
Yes, my wild little Poet.

Sing the new year in under the blue.
Last year you sang it as gladly.
“New, new, new, new!” Is it then so new
That you should carol so madly?

“Love again, song again, nest again, young again!”
Never a prophet so crazy!
And hardly a daisy as yet, little friend,
See, there is hardly a daisy.

“Here again, here, here, here, happy year!”
O warble unchidden, unbidden!
Summer is coming, is coming, my dear,
And all the winters are hidden.

NOTES AND QUESTIONS

=Biography.= Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) was poet laureate of
England, succeeding Wordsworth. This means that he was appointed
to write poems about matters of national interest, such as his ode
on the death of the Duke of Wellington; and that he also expressed
something of the national spirit of England, as in his poems about
King Arthur (_The Idylls of the King_) and in many poems about his
native land. He was born in Lincolnshire and studied at Trinity
College, Cambridge. He lived a quiet life and devoted himself to
poetry, in which he excelled in beauty of expression and choice of
words. You will learn to know him as a teller of tales in verse,
these tales being both modern ballads and romances about King Arthur;
as a writer of many lovely song-poems or lyrics; and as a poet of
religious faith.

=Note.= The song-thrush, or throstle, is found in most parts of
England, and is one of the finest songsters in Europe. Its note is
rich and mellow. This is the bird of which Browning wrote,

“He sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!”

=Discussion.= 1. Which lines in the first stanza represent the song
of the bird? 2. Which line gives Tennyson’s answer to the throstle?
3. Point out the words in the poem that represent the bird’s song. 4.
Which lines tell you that Tennyson did not share the little bird’s
hope? 5, What do the last two lines show that the bird did for the
poet?

=Phrases=

wild little Poet, 49, 4
carol so madly, 49, 8
never a prophet so crazy, 49, 10
winters are hidden, 49, 16

TO THE CUCKOO

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

O blithe newcomer! I have heard,
I hear thee and rejoice;
O cuckoo! shall I call thee bird,
Or but a wandering voice?

While I am lying on the grass,
Thy twofold shout I hear;
From hill to hill it seems to pass,
At once far off and near.

Though babbling only to the vale,
Of sunshine and of flowers,
Thou bringest unto me a tale
Of visionary hours.

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring!
Even yet thou art to me
No bird, but an invisible thing,
A voice, a mystery;

The same whom in my schoolboy days
I listened to; that cry
Which made me look a thousand ways,
In bush, and tree, and sky.