jungle, the elephants know that the easiest and most expeditious
way for a large body of animals to traverse a tangled forest is
for the leader to pick the way, while all the others follow in his
footsteps.

In strong contrast with the stealthy and noiseless manner in which
elephants steal away from a lurking danger, or an ambush
discovered, from an open attack accompanied with the noise of
fire-arms they rush away at headlong speed, quite regardless of
the noise they make. On one occasion a herd which I was designing
to attack, and had approached to within forty yards, as its
members were feeding in some thick bushes, discovered my presence
and retreated so silently that they had been gone five minutes
before I discovered what their sudden quietude really meant. In
this instance, as in several others, the still alarm was
communicated by silent signals, or sign-language.

At the Zoological Park we reared an African pygmy elephant
(_Elephas pumilio_). When his slender little tusks grew to
eighteen inches in length he made some interesting uses of them.
Once when the keepers wished to lead him upon our large platform
scales, the trembling of the platform frightened him. He conceived
the idea that it was unsafe, and therefore that he must keep off.
He backed away, halted, and refused to leave solid ground. The men
pushed him. He backed, and trumpeted a shrill protest. The men
pushed harder, and forced him forward. Trumpeting his wild alarm
and his protest against what he regarded as murder, he fell upon
his knees and drove his tusks into the earth, quite up to his
mouth, to anchor himself firmly to the solid ground. It was
pathetic, but also amusing. When Congo finally was pushed upon the