re we dug a hole for the elephant; my patron designing to
return when it had fallen to pieces and take its teeth to trade with.

"I continued this employment for two months, and killed an elephant
every day, getting sometimes upon one tree, and sometimes upon another.
One morning, as I looked for the elephants, I perceived with extreme
amazement that, instead of passing by me across the forest as usual,
they stopped, and came to me with a horrible noise, in such number that
the plain was covered, and shook under them. They encompassed the tree
in which I was concealed, with their trunks extended, and all fixed
their eyes upon me. At this alarming spectacle I continued immovable,
and was so much terrified, that my bow and arrows fell out of my hand.

"My fears were not without cause; for after the elephants had stared
upon me some time, one of the largest of them put his trunk round the
foot of the tree, plucked it up, and threw it on the ground. I fell with
the tree; and the elephant, taking me up with his trunk, laid me on his
back, where I sat more like one dead than alive, with my quiver on my
shoulder. He put himself afterward at the head of the rest, who followed
him in troops, carried me a considerable way, then laid me down on the
ground, and retired with all his companions. After having lain some
time, and seeing the elephants gone, I got up, and found I was upon a
long and broad hill, almost covered with the bones and teeth of
elephants. I confess to you, that this object furnished me with
abundance of reflections. I admired the instinct of those animals; I
doubted not but that was their burying-place, and that they carried me
thither on purpose to tell me that I should forbear to persecute them,
since I did it only for their teeth. I did not stay on the hill, but
turned toward the city, and, after having travelled a day and a night, I
came to my patron.

"As soon as he saw me, 'Ah, poor Sinbad,' exclaimed he, 'I was in great
trouble to know what was become of you. I have been at the forest, where
I found a tree newly pulled up, and a bow and arrows on the ground, and
I despaired of ever seeing you more. Pray tell me what befell you, and
by what good chance you are still alive.' I satisfied his curiosity, and
going both of us next morning to the hill, he found to his great joy
that what I had told him was true. We loaded the elephant which had
carried us with as many teeth as he could bear; and when we were
r