ool for teaching them to throw
straight if I were in authority. The bits are so little when you get
them too--mere atoms.'

'Always thinking about eating,' says the African one, who is a lady.
'Really, I wish they would give you more hay or something to stuff
yourself up with. For me, I don't care what I have to eat, but I do long
for a little heat and a good plunge in a real river with soft muddy
banks instead of my wretched tank sometimes.'

'Ah!' the Indian elephant answers, 'is there anything like it, that
plunge after a long, hot, sleepy day, when one has stood about under the
trees? I used to have a particular tree I always went and leaned
against. It just fitted my side, and I wore the trunk quite smooth. And
there I stood all the long, hot day, with sound of the rich forest life
in my ears, the buzz and hum of the myriad things that fly and swarm,
and the dense leaves kept off the sun; it was dark and hot. Then, when
evening came, and it grew a little cooler, we used to join together, all
of us who belonged to the same herd, and go down to the water. Then what
romping and splashing, what trumpeting and fun! We squirted each other
with mud and water, and came out fresh and cool. Ah, those were grand
times!'

'You were a fool to get caught,' said the African one rudely, for she
had not very good manners. 'How did it happen?'

The Indian elephant looked quite sad, and winked his little eyes as if
he thought he should cry. 'It was a terrible story that,' he said, 'and
the lesson is, never depend on women. I met one day a handsome elephant
in the forest, who seemed to me the nicest I had ever seen. She was not
very big, but her ears were particularly large, and hung down so
gracefully; and as for her feet, I don't think I've ever seen such
beautiful great flat feet on an elephant. Well, I loved her, and she
seemed to like me, and we talked together and rubbed trunks, and were
very happy, and I forgot where I was quite; and the next thing was I
found I was shut in between high palisades, and when I tried to get out
the gate was shut. And then men threw ropes over me, and tied my feet to
great poles; and the wicked little elephant ran away grinning, for she
was a decoy. You've heard of them perhaps--elephants who are tamed by
humans, who teach them to be wicked and go out into the forest just in
order to trap their own kind and bring them into captivity? It was sad,
very sad!'

'But you are happy and contented he