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altogether it took five weeks for Kari to become accustomed to camp. At
last he stayed one day and one night through. After that he gave no trouble.
In the meantime the old fellow was starving in his noose but nobody could
go near him. He had eaten up everything in sight and now was starving
royally. The moment he saw a human being he charged to the length of his
rope. We had caught him in another lasso and tied the same leg twice over
to a tree. He was secure no doubt. All we could do for a while was to ride
around him with our tame elephants but we could not go very near. Now and
then we would throw at him a bunch of bananas weighing about ten pounds.
He would get nothing more for two days at a time. Apparently this
impressed on his mind the fact that man was his friend because he gave him
food. Pretty soon we would leave him ten pounds a day and each time we
drew a little nearer. One day I was so close to him that the beast could have
stepped on me but he did nothing to injure me. The following day my Father
made bold and touched the elephant's trunk. The old bull did not hurt him.
After Kari's return we tied them together very loosely by their necks and
started toward civilization. As we came nearer and nearer the edge of the
jungle, the two wild animals began to fret. Kari did not like it and the old
bull began to show intimations of anger and hate. At night they were
picketed separately and once when everybody was asleep we heard a terrible
trumpeting in the dark. We all got up and lighted our torches but before we
had finished we saw the wild elephant charging at one of the tents. The old
bull killed one of the two trappers who were sleeping there and ripped up the
whole place as the gale rips up a cloud. That instant we could see in the
dark by the light of our torch that Kari had come from nowhere and was
upon him. No matter which way the old bull elephant started to go Kari
would stand in front of him and each time Kari received the charge of his
tusks on his own flanks. We brought out the old, tame elephant but it was
no good. All he could do was to stand between us and the bull but he did not
do anything to help Kari fight him. The Rajah said:
"Let us shoot him to death."
"Do not shoot him," cried Gopal. "I am sure Kari can conquer him and
then there will be no danger of Kari's returning to the herd, for by beating
the bull Kari will put himself beyond the pale of elephant society and he will
have to become reconciled to humanity."
So we let the fight go on; it grew more and more intense. The elephants
butted against each other. Tusks crashed in the night and with their trunks
the elephants tried to choke each other, but it turned out very soon that Kari
was no match for the old fellow, whose tusks were larger and whose strength
was greater than Kari's. But he did not have Kari's agility nor his
intelligence. Kari was pressed harder and harder till finally he put his back
against a tree. Every time the old elephant butted him the tree shook almost
like a blade of grass in the wind but Kari would have a moment in which to
rest. It was the old bull after all, who gave out. With unheard-of fierceness
he put his head down and went for Kari's chest but he missed his charge.
Instead of piercing Kari with his tusk, one of Kari's tusks stuck in the mouth
of the bull. Then they began to spin around in a circle. The entire ground
seemed to rock under their feet. The moon set. The day broke. And the old
elephant bled more and more profusely yet he could not do anything to
shake off Kari's tusk sticking into his month. Suddenly Kari shook his head
violently and slashed open the left side of the old elephant's mouth, and with
the deftness of a fencer, at almost the same time he stuck his tusk under the
chin of the old fellow. The shock of it was so great that the bull fell, literally
pounding the ground. It sounded like the beat of a great drum resounding
through the whole earth. Kari bent his front legs and butted and butted again
until the old fellow's throat was lacerated. He could breathe no more. With a
snarl of anger Kari stood up, trumpeted at us and plunged into the jungle.
When we reached the old elephant his two eyes were lusterless as stone. His
legs were stiff. Vultures began to whir in the air, which was the sure sign of
death. We started to saw off his tusks. They measured seven feet in length.
We waited a whole week for Kari to come back. The sight of blood
enrages an elephant so that he does not like to stay near it. He goes away as
if to purify himself from the hate and the fear that has soiled him during a
fight, but once his feelings are calmed and his self-respect restored, then, if
he is able to remember, he comes back by the same path that drew him away
and turns into a docile elephant once more.
About ten days we waited; and then we started for home. It was near the
end of our journey when one afternoon we saw Kari coming toward us, it
seemed from nowhere. Only those who know the soul of the animal can tell
how it was that he found us. Kari went straight to his master and put his
trunk around him. I thought he was going to kill him, but no, it was because
he was glad to have found his master.
At the end of our journey the Rajah and Gopal had a consultation with my
Father. They wished to leave Kari with us for a time and Gopal called out to
the now perfectly subdued elephant and said to him:
"O Lord of the Jungle and Pearl among Elephants, this is the parting of the
ways. Wilt thou return to the market place or is it thy will to remain near the
jungle for yet a space with thy new friends, the great hunter and his son,
gradually accustoming thyself to the ways of men; what is thy wish, Lordly
One?''
Kari bowed before his master and Gopal led him to us,
"He has consented to stay," he said, "and he will keep his promise." In the
next chapter I shall tell you about my life with Kari, which was filled with
romance and with beauty.
CHAPTER VIII
KARI, BETWIXT CITY AND COUNTRY
MY father and I spent the most wonderful time of our life with Kari. He
would carry us on his back into the very deepest and most secret recesses of
the jungle where the mysteries of its life are profound and inscrutable to
men. In the deeper passes where the air is tranquil, where the winds cannot
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