solemnly shook their heads and said: "Oh, no! That can not be
true. No ape ever did that. He is romancing!" But now we know that
this breast-beating and chest-clapping habit is to a gorilla a
common-place performance, even in captivity.

Sometimes there are more things in heaven and earth than are
dreamt of in all our philosophy.




XI

THE MIND OF THE ELEPHANT


It was in the jungles of the Animallai Hills of southern India
that I first became impressed by the mental capacity of the Indian
elephant. I saw many wild herds. I saw elephants at work, and at
one period I lived in a timber camp, consisting of working
elephants and mahouts. I saw a shrewd young elephant-driver
soundly flogged for stealing an elephant, farming it out to a
native timber contractor for four days, and then elaborately
pretending that the animal had been "lost." Later on I saw
elephant performances in the "Greatest Show on Earth" and
elsewhere, and for eighteen years I have been chief mourner over
the idiosyncrasies of Gunda and Alice. If I do not now know
something about elephants, then my own case of animal intelligence
is indeed hopeless.