He called across the parade ground to his white-clad Mussulman butler, who
was looking down at him from the bungalow.

"Bring that fruit off my table," he said in Hindustani. "Also the little
medicine chest and a bowl of water."

When the servant had brought them Dermot approached the elephant.

"_Khubbadar_--(take care)--sahib!" cried a coolie, the _mahout's_
assistant. "He is suffering and angry. He may do you harm."

But, while the rebuked _mahout_ glared malevolently and inwardly hoped that
the animal might kill him, Dermot walked calmly toward it, holding out his
hand with the fruit. The elephant, regarding him nervously and suspiciously
out of its little eyes, shifted uneasily from foot to foot, and at first
shrank from him. But, as the officer stood quietly in front of it, it
stretched out its trunk and smelled the extended hand. Then it touched the
arm and felt it up to the shoulder, on which it let the tip of the trunk
rest for a few seconds. At last it seemed satisfied that the white man was
a friend and did not intend to hurt it.

During the ordeal Dermot had never moved; although there was every reason
to fear that the animal, either from sheer nervousness or from resentment
at the ill-treatment that it had just received, might attack him and
trample him to death. Indeed, many tame elephants, being unused to
Europeans, will not allow white men to approach them. So the Hindu coolie
stood trembling with fright, while the _havildar_ and the butler were
alarmed at their sahib's peril.