There are several explanations of the rogue elephant's fury, and without doubt one cause is a desire to revenge some ill treatment. This is well shown in the case of a certain Cingalese elephant. Its keeper prodded it very cruelly in the head. The elephant lost patience, and, reaching up, dragged him from its back and hurled him to the ground. Fortunately, the driver fell into a hole or depression, where the elephant did not see him. The elephant, hitherto peaceful, immediately became a revengeful rogue, and started out upon what proved a tour of destruction. It ran through a neighboring village, and broke into a house, and killed the owner. Several hours later it wrecked houses in other villages, and killed natives in four or five towns. The houses or huts were crushed and rent, evidently in the search for human victims, though this rogue did not confine itself to men alone, but attacked horses and cattle. Finally the elephant tried to enter the palace of the Dehra Rajah, and, upon being driven off, returned to the house of its original owner at Bebipur. This house it tried to demolish in order to catch the persons concealed there. The savage creature was finally captured by a body of men with tame elephants.
An old copy of the "Colombo Observer" contains this advertisement: "ROGUE ELEPHANT. A reward of twenty-five guineas will be paid for the destruction of the rogue elephant on the Rajawalle plantation." The elephant here referred to had taken up its residence on this coffee plantation, and had so terrified the people that all work was suspended. Its operations and misdeeds were always conducted at night, at which time it would mysteriously appear and devote its attention to destroying buildings, uprooting trees, and demolishing the work of the men. The waterworks, pipes, and other objects on the plantation seemed especially to irritate the animal, and they were torn up or stamped upon and ruined. The rogue was finally conquered by a party organized for the purpose.
Rogues are sometimes merely mischievous. A party of surveyors in India found that the wooden pegs which they set out were pulled up with much regularity by an elephant. The same joker stole a surveyor's chain, and seemed to delight in shaking it about to hear it jingle.
An elephant in a circus or menagerie sometimes becomes a rogue, and during the past few years a number of such instances have occurred. Ferocious as the rogue elephant appears to be, its record as a man-killer is far below that of other animals. Thus in India, in 1875, the tigers killed 828 persons and 12,423 domestic animals; wolves killed 1061 persons; leopards 187 persons and 16,157 domestic animals; while the elephant is charged with but 61 persons killed, and 6 domestic animals. Rogue tigers, wolves, and leopards are far more to be dreaded than rogue elephants.
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SOME BABY BIRDS.
IT is in spring that our fields, hedges, and woods resound with the most joyous notes from our feathered friends. In the apple trees, among the blossoms, the robins hold a festival; in the old dead tree over the way we may perhaps find a nest of bluebirds; in the vines around our cottage door a sparrow chirps about her young; and from an aged hollow-topped clothespole we may hear faint peeps, and may see a little wren disappear within. Even the chimneys are converted into nurseries for the swallows, while the hedges, cedars, and other retreats all form shelters for baby birds.
What a cry for food this great nursery sets up! The slightest noise near the nest, and baby mouths are held up, always open, and seemingly never satisfied. Fathers and mothers work so hard that they scarcely have time to eat. The first worms and insects that come out after their long winter sleep are captured for these babies, and in such numbers that it is a wonder that any are left to enjoy the summer days.
Of all our familiar birds, the little owls are among the most curious. They are mere bundles of fuzz and feathers, and if we are fortunate enough to find the nest, the sight proves an interesting one. The old tree, grim and forsaken, except perhaps by clinging vines and moss, gives little token of the family within; but we draw near the dark hole that once bore a sturdy limb, scratch upon the bark, and, presto! four queer heads, with sharp black eyes, pop into view, exactly as if we had touched a spring—only to fall back as quickly when they find out their mistake.
"Four heads pop into view."
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The old birds mate as early as February, and in May the nursery is begun. Sometimes, as we have seen, it is in a hollow tree or in a crevice in the rock; again, we may find the nest on a large bough high in air. When in this position, the home is formed of large dried sticks; crooked twigs are laid for the foundation, and the interior is lined with soft grasses and sometimes feathers, so that the entire nest is perhaps three feet across. Soon after its completion, four and sometimes six eggs will be found, and then the vigilance of both parents is necessary, as it is the only brood of the season.
When the mother bird becomes tired, her mate takes her place and guards the home while she travels off to rob some neighboring farmyard of a stray duck or chicken. The young do not leave their home until they are fully feathered, and they are fed on rats, mice, rabbits, and small birds, and develop a most remarkable appetite.
In April we may find upon the ground, on marshy shores by some river or creek, a plain nest formed of a few withered leaves and branches, carelessly placed, as if the mother were a poor housekeeper. At this time it perhaps contains five or six clay-colored eggs spotted with brown and purple. Visiting it a little later, we shall find the birds out—the strangest little creatures imaginable. They lie cuddled together, a mass of brownish-white down. When disturbed they start up and topple over, and appear to be all legs and bills. A great brown stripe runs down the back; another passes through the eye and under it, while others under the delicate wings give these baby woodcocks the appearance of woolly zebras. The legs and long bill are purple, and certainly these are the prettiest of all the bird babies we have seen.
The smallest of the bird babies is the humming bird. The largest was the epiornis, now extinct. One of its eggs was equal in size to twelve thousand humming bird's eggs. The nest of the humming bird is often found in pear trees or apple trees, and is a beautiful structure. The exterior is made up of small pieces of the dark and gray lichens which the mother finds upon trees and rocks. These are placed all about the nest, and glued together by some secretion from her mouth. Almost always she selects pieces for the outer covering that will match in color the surrounding branches, so that the nest is really protected by its color. In the interior she places layers of the wings of flying seeds, and on these the downy silk of the mullein, with delicate bits of fern. From this attractive nest two little ones can be seen pushing out their little bills, taking their food from their mother's mouth.
It is generally believed that humming birds can utter only a faint chirp; but John G. Bell, the naturalist, and companion of Audubon on many of his travels, stated that at least one of the hummers has a regular song—a discovery he made in Central America. Becoming fatigued during a hunt, Mr. Bell threw himself down beneath a richly flowered bush, and soon was attracted by the beautiful hummers that flew from flower to flower. Finally, thinking he heard a little song, he kept perfectly quiet until a tiny bird—the little gray hermit—came quite near him. Then the song was plainly heard. He afterwards paid particular attention to this species, and often heard the delicate intonation, which he describes as like the song of the canary, only lower.
Resembling the woodcock are the baby snipes, which, soon after they leave the nest, run upon the shore, and so much like the pebbles and the sandy beach are they in color and tint that considerable experience is required to distinguish them from their surroundings.
"Snipes."
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The cunning of the mother snipe is remarkable and almost beyond belief. On one occasion, in walking along the beach with a companion, we turned around a large rock, and up from our feet sprang a snipe, piping with all her might. Over our heads she flew, and alighted on a rock over which we had recently passed, and so near that we could almost have caught her. At her approach she flew a little farther off and acted very strangely, as though hurt. Then suddenly it occurred to us that she was purposely leading us away. Such was the case, for as we returned she followed us with loud protest, and near the rock from which she first flew we found her family of baby snipes, just large enough to start away and give us a chase.
We caught one, a beautiful little creature with gentle, dovelike eyes, that seemed quite content to cuddle in our hands and utter a gentle peep not louder than the voice of a mouse; but the poor mother's anxiety was so evident that we gave the little one its liberty, and its diminutive legs soon carried it to a place of safety.
This trick of attracting people away from the nest is often repeated by the old snipes, and one has been seen to hop along on one leg, with wings drooping, until the innocent sportsman was well away from the young, when off she would dart to rejoin them when the field was entirely clear. The spotted sandpiper protects its babies by the same device.
The baby herons are laughable little creatures, for when they are first hatched, they differ little in appearance from an ordinary puffball; when a little older, they are fuzzy objects, seemingly covered with long hairs. Those who have visited Cape May may have noticed their nests in the cedars near there, where the blue heron, little egret, and green bittern all live in a colony.
Some curious black babies are seen in young rails, which, in the spring, are found in the marshes along creeks and rivers of the Middle States. The nest is built of grass, and the moment the eggs are hatched, off run the little ones, looking like mice running in and out among the grass. The young of the clapper rail are very similar, only they are larger, and covered with black down, with one or two spots or streaks of white, one spot being near the bill. The clappers make their nests near the sea, where they are often washed away by heavy gales. After such a storm the males have been seen walking about, as if disconsolate, near where their nests have been, while hundreds of the dead mothers have been seen strewn around, showing that they died with their little ones. The young of the Virginia rail frequently share the same fate, and so great is the mother's grief that she seems forgetful of all fear, and cannot be driven from the spot where her nest stood.