The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals: A Book of Personal Observations

On rare occasions an enraged wild elephant deliberately tramples a man to death; and there is one instance on record wherein the elephant held his dead native victim firmly to the ground while he tore him asunder "and actually jerked his arms and legs to some distance." In captivity a mean elephant kills a keeper, or other person, by suddenly knocking him down, and then either trampling upon him or impaling him. Gunda, our big male Indian tusker, was the worst elephant with which I ever came in close touch, and we hope never to see his like again. When about ten years old he came to us direct from Assam, and when I saw his big and bulging eyes, and the slits torn in his ears, I recognized him as a bad-tempered animal. I kept my opinions to myself. Two weeks later when we started Gunda's Hindu keeper back toward his native land, I sent for Keepers Gleason and Forester to give them a choice lot of instruction in elephant management. They heard me through attentively, and then Forester said very solemnly: "Director, I think that is a bad elephant; and I'm afraid of him!" Keeper Gleason willingly took him over, on condition that he should have sole charge of him, and as long as Gleason remained in our service he managed the elephant successfully. Elsewhere I have spoken at length of Gunda's mind and manners. He went steadily from bad to worse; but we never once really punished him. The time was when there was only one man in the world whom he feared, and would obey, and that was his keeper, Walter Thuman. I have seen that great dangerous beast cower and quake with fear, and back off into a corner, when Thuman's powerful voice yelled at him, and admonished him to behave himself. But all that ended on the day that he "got" Thuman.