Unfreakingbelievable.
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(119 votes, average: 4.70 out of 5)An elephant that can paint elephants
Posted on Wednesday, January 9th, 2008 under Entertainment
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yay i can be like all the dumb fucks (FIRST) but any ways they are a very smart animal
smart elephants.
having a precise organ such as a trump and being able to draw pictures of your same kind is way different.
Am I the only one to think this is weird?
Some of you may know this, but I beleive a lot of material on this site is real. I am one of those who hate it when people claim certain videos are fake, but, I didn’t get to see the elephant actually paint a whole entire picture. So, I’m sorry for those of you who hate people who claim material to be fake, but I think this was FAKE!!!
And sorry for the long post, I hate reading too…
eddy you idiot this is 100 % real if you havent heard lately that they have been testing on elephants and we have many proof that its real…
Take a look here:
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=painting+elephants
There are quite a few sites selling ‘Elephant art’, but the samples they have are what you would expect from an elephant. Maybe they made up the titles. :p
This is the most noteworthy example, and it is yet to be seen if it isn’t just coincidentally an elephant:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/5203120.stm
Yes, painting elephants exist, but not to this extend. The video went over the top by bringing in an artist to show the elephant a number of paintings and explaining about them. You see the animal has been trained to stroke the canvas, as he obviously tries - only to find out that it doesn’t have a brush.
Hey, Camo… you’re an idiot.
Isn’t it a bit arrogant to assume that all animals are stupid, just because they aren’t exactly like we are? For example, pigs are highly intelligent animals, similar to dogs in their brain power. Cows are also intelligent and show developed emotion. The fact that an elephant can paint is hardly surprising. What is suprising is the idea that the elephants “have to earn their keep” as stated on this video - wtf?! Put them back in the wild!!!!
No, Obnoxious, at the end the elephant isn’t even doing the same gestures as painting (without a paintbrush). The elephant is just having some type of reaction to the painting (whacking it). When the elephants paint its not slapping the canvas. They actually paint like a person would, slow, gliding strokes.
Eddy, I can say that I could not believe it with my own eyes, I have been to the sanctuary. This is amazing. I am always amazed when I see humanistic traits from an animal, kinda brings us closer to Earth.
Thank you Mark for your polite response. The reason I don’t believe what the showed me is because I only saw glimpses of the elephant painting. I don’t know if the editors caught footage of the elephant coicidentally looking like it was painting. If I saw an entire video of the elephant painting the whole picture I would believe it, just this video didn’t show me enough evidence for me to believe. If I were to see enough real footage, I would be up for believing… I only need guidance.
this is amazing in lots of ways
1. shows that elephants can distinguish between different colours and use them realistically
2. elephants understand art as a representation of something else (something humans cant do until around 6 years or older)
3. elephants have imagination - notice how she painted elephants holding stuff they didnt actually have (a flower, a flag, etc)
It’s amazing to me, and I don’t believe this is one bit fake. Animals are a lot more intelligent than we think they are.
you don’t see the trunk in one piece whenever it paints something ”non-abstract”; i.e. ”non-random”.
please stop being stupid. just stop. please.
they are guided to by their handlers ..otherwise it’s just abstracts they create..
What I find funny is people saying, “Oh wow, this brings us closer to Earth when animals have human like elements.”
Um. Last time I checked, we were animals too.
My dog can sit, stay, lay down, roll over, play dead when I point at it and say “POW”, army crawl, and limp. I imagine elephants are smarter than dogs and if no one noticed it was always the same picture being shown (elephand w/ flower-thing). Some thai trainer got the 40,000 trunk muscles trained to follow a pattern, big deal.
Ive been to Thailand and seen the elephant paint these pictures, it is definitely real, they are just as smart or even smarter than dolphins
Really, folks, pay attention. You never actually saw the elephant painting the representational pictures, just a section of trunk.
Yes, elephants can splash paint around with a brush. They cannot do sketches of each other.
Here is another video of the elephant painting a picture. You can see it painting more clearly in this one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNODzXoJuJM
and here is another one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oYYXfM1Jw0
[...] I came across •this video• on the web of an elephant that can not only paint, but paint likenesses of other elephants! [...]
[...] Check it out. Posted in Fascists, Internet. [...]
[...] Por si lo que os he contado no fuese lo suficiente como para haberos hecho levantar al menos una ceja, os dejo un video de un elefante que pinta elefantes por ver si eso hace que levantéis las dos. [...]
[...] An elephant that can paint elephants! An elephant that can paint elephants How cool is that? __________________ "There is no truth. There is only perception.” Gustave Flaubert [...]
I would like to see the elephant paint without a trainer standing next to her. I think she is being given precise signals as to what to do. She has probably been trained as to which color is blue, yellow, etc. If they can teach gorillas or parrots different colors, why not elephants.
Unfortunately elephants are not safe in the wild due to ivory poachers.
I wonder if it has a dA account
a ‘trump’? Elephants play bridge?
[...] Ο ελÎφαντας που ζωγÏαφίζει άλλους ελÎφαντες [...]
Bummer it cut the clip short…
Koko the painting gorrilla was a more expressive painter. Since Koko could also use sign language, she could explain what the painting meant after she was done!
Her most powerful painting was one of a memory of childhood - a poacher murdering her mother! There was a lot of red, the brush strokes showed rage and hurt. I want to say it sold for many thousands, US.
[...] DJUR - helt makalöst konstigt - elefanter som målar http://www.noob.us/entertainment/an-elephant-that-can-paint-elephants/ [...]
who cares…
holy cow! his drawings are much BETTER than mine!!!
[...] Also, check out this amazing video of an elephant who creates paintings with recognizable figures. I suspect that the elephant’s trainers have cheated on this one, training her to paint a single recognizable figure, which she then repeats every time she’s handed a brush. [...]
first … no one called it
i found one on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LHoyB81LnE
Its all a trick. They are trained to do it, just as they are trained to hula-hoop. Would any of you suggest that they hula-hoop for fun? That they discovered it for themselves? Highly imporbable.
Remember Occam’s Razor.
Still for those skeptics like Eddy Sp@ghett! i will post the FULL video of the elephant doing some painting.
Enough evidence for you Eddy Sp@ghett! ;)?
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1203547/elephant_painting/
for you doubters, it is obvious you do not know much about elephants. they are extremely smart, possibly more than many of you. they have very long memories also, and it has been documented that if they were treated badly, that even years later, they remember the person, and many have gotten revenge, by harming or killing the person who had mis-treated them in the past.
The elephant painting “gag” was done in the United States vaudeville and as a circus side show attraction but was eventually banned due to animal cruelty (the trunk was wired sometimes on the outside sometimes piercing the skin and running inside and controlled like an Asian Stick Puppet (the “gag” has Asian origins). Later, a variation of this popped up where the handler controlled the lines from behind the painting (David Copperfield uses this without an animal). Asian countries don’t have such bans. Several videos can be viewed, watch if the trainer is standing beside the elephant or kneeling with his hand behind the painting to determine which “gag” he is using.
[...] Many of you were skeptical of the last video featuring an elephant that could paint other elephants. Here is a better clip from start to end with no stops in between. [...]
This is abuse.
Here’s an article from National Geographic. I would think if it were abuse, NG would be the ones to report it.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/06/0626_020626_elephant.html
Pretty enlightening.
Ntiona Geographic is a bullshit source of information, exploitation and romanticization of other cultures. Bad resource altogether.
This is totally abuse.
Some inescapable conclusions:
- Elephants have complete self awareness and can project it as an abstraction.
- They can plan and execute.
- They can visually recombine familiar objects in creative ways.
- They have aesthetic sense for harmonious visual elements.
- They conceptually grasp a system of tools and materials.
- They grasp the concept of two dimensions to represent three.
- They can compose a finished mental image, retain it, and transfer it accurately.
- They are whimsical.
Thank you all!!! You are all gentleman’s and scholars.
Is there any video showin:
Where & how the elephants live?
How they are trained?
How they obtain these elephants?
How does one become an elephant owner for $$$$ ?
What (if any) are these performing animals rights?
How the painting $$$ is spent?
Why do the paintings seem to cry out.,,,
“Help Me”??????
These elephants are all babies or young adults.
where are there mother’s?
I’ll tell you where,
dead and dried up where they were shot.
where do they live when not performing?
I’ll tell you where,
Chained up, unable to move in any direction.
How do they train them to do these amazing tricks?
I’ll tell you how,
They are starved, beaten, broken and driven to insanity.
They are denied any way of life that is natural to their existance.
why don’t they just kill the heartless little bug eating assholes?
I’ll tell you why,
They are above and better than any one of those trainers , tourist and poachers.
Their revenge will not be murder. It will come when they reside in Heaven, while the evil humans dwell in Hell!
That elephant paints better than I ever did.
“But they are very intelligent animals and create the entire paintings with great gusto and concentration within just five or 10 minutes - the only thing they cannot do on their own is pick up a paintbrush, so it gets handed to them.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/5203120.stm
http://www.elephantartgallery.com/meet/
see this webstie, it’s kinda cool~~maybe will change your perspectives?
Check out the man’s hand. He’s carrying a hook. That’s a smaller version of the bull hook he uses to inflict pain. It’s the tool used to force those precise strokes to be made. That’s the only way to train a huge animal to do unnatural acts. Beatings, starvation, stabbings with the bull hook. All you have to do is read up on elephant training.
y the f**k is she talkin 2 the elephant like it speaks english???
and y whould an elephant like 2 paint???
it not like they’ve been doin it for 100s of yrs it only this 1
i feel sorry for the elephant beenin made 2 paint it self
What the hell I think you should sale the lephant paints for alot of money!!!
[...] art An elephant that can paint elephants this is amazing __________________ MySpace Flickr Facebook [...]
Interesting …
Folks,
Elephants do paint and they are darn good at it. In Thailand at most of the elephant camps, the elephants are treated quite humanely.
Elephants are not inflicted with pain to paint - they enjoy it. I have spent time with them and know the camp owners.
Read my blog for more information on elephant paintings:
http://anelephantshome.blogspot.com/
Don’t forget that Elephants like peanuts more than raisins, unless the raisins are in a cereal bowl mixed with bran flakes. They also made excellent test subjects when demonstrating the power of electricity in the late `1800’s.
Oh yeah, I should also mention they hate mice - I’ve seen them jump up on a footstool when confronted with the tiny vermin. Hope this helps give a little more insight to these wonderful creatures.
Thought a little more about elephants and realized I needed to be honest about my real intentions with respct to elephants.
I’ll admit I’m big time meat eater and have set a personal goal to eat as many different types of animals as possible. It’s a long list so far, but there are obviously some species that have eluded my dinner plate - one of which is the elephant. Unfortunately, society takes a dim view of lunching on so called intelligent species. Dolphins, whales, apes are all off the menu and now with this little talent for painting, my dream of chowing down on an elephant burger is likely going to remain just a dream. I sometimes try and imagine what elephant would taste like - probably a bit like chicken - doesn’t look like I’ll ever find out!
Growing up watching the Flintstones, I sure envied Fred feeding on those Brontosaurus burgers - Dinosaurs are another taste that I’ll only be able to imagine. If I could wish for anything in the world, it would be for a major dinosaur find deep in the ice, that could be harvested for a very exclusive frozen dinner.
Sorry for getting off topic - Elephants are quite intelligent and possibly good eating!
Kind of reminds me of that Honey Comb cereal commercial in the 70s.
“Elephants big ya ya ya he’s not small no no no Elephants got a big big bite he tastes great ya ya ya”
or something like that can’t quite remember. In response to the last comment Ely is quite tough there’s a little cafe just outside Kenya called Phantasy eats…Best have it served poached in a nice peanut sauce. My second choice on the menu is the Hamphant in a fresh Kaiser you’ll never forget it!!
On the video I saw the trainers stood beside the elephant and directed them by moving their tusks up and down. The elephant would follow the trainers direction with brush strokes. This was only for figurative drawings of elephants.
For the abstracts the elephant was given a colour and then allowed to use their trunk to brush the colour on the canvas in whatever way they wanted.
Different elephants showed different character in their paintings that you could recognize just by looking at the painting.
Their trunks are quite strong so they can move them in different ways.
Dreamer
Mahouts (trainers) DON NOT move the elephant artists trunks up and down. Yes, they touch the elephant which reassures the elephant. They also tlak to the elephant which has the same calming effect AND also directs the elephant (left, right, up, down, etc.)
Certainly, an elephant painting is a collaberative effort between elephant and trainer and each elephant artist (not all elephants enjoy painting) has their own style. But putting brush to paper is only done by elephant alone and subsequent painting is truly a “trunk work”.
Thank you, Thank you, Thank you; it’s so refreshing to read so many stories and comments about the great travesty that we know as “Elephant paintingsâ€. After a traumatic event that my wife experienced on our last tour to Thailand I have become deeply involved with this issue. I share your views and concerns (except for a couple of you “nut jobs†who continue to post comments) I am sure you will all agree and some will change their opinions of this so called art after you hear our story. While dinning at our favourite restaurant in Sing Buri a crowd gathered on the road by the restaurant. A woman with a beautiful elephant set up what looked to us as an art display on the road side. We had never seen an elephant up close so naturally we were extremely intrigued. Soon the crowd became quite loud and the elephant started to become agitated. At this point I thought let’s get out of here so I turned to my wife to signal her to leave, to my surprise my wife was already gone. At least that’s what I thought, she was on the floor convulsing and clutching her throat. As the disturbance had progressed she had started to choke, unbeknownst to the rest of us who were watching the show. Thankfully a tall Hindu man carried out chest thrusts on my wife and dislodged what we later found out to be a small bit of paint brush that was apparently floating in her Jumbo soup. To this day I hate elephants.
Peg - That is incredible.
The particular animal that planted the brush in that soup was probably full of pent up anger. It wanted to harm a human and didn’t care which one. You’ll likely never be able to identify the guilty culprit, but I hear your rage - I would suggest all pachaderms are capable of similar acts against humans. If you look close (but not too close, cause they’ll stomp you), you can see the hatred in their eyes.
If you do a search on YouTube, there are a number of graphic videos showing elephants attacking people. I wonder if it makes them feel big, kicking our asses - real fair fight! - 5 tons verses a 120 lb. starving indian.
They are intelligent and given an opportunity will become an issue. The best bet for mankind’s survival is controlled harvesting.
Early one morning the sub-inspector at a police
station the other end of the town rang me up on the phone and said that
an elephant was ravaging the bazaar. Would I please come and do something
about it? I did not know what I could do, but I wanted to see what was
happening and I got on to a pony and started out. I took my rifle, an
old .44 Winchester and much too small to kill an elephant, but I thought
the noise might be useful IN TERROREM. Various Burmans stopped me on the
way and told me about the elephant’s doings. It was not, of course, a
wild
elephant, but a tame one which had gone “must.” It had been chained up,
as tame elephants always are when their attack of “must” is due, but on
the previous night it had broken its chain and escaped. Its mahout, the
only person who could manage it when it was in that state, had set out in
pursuit, but had taken the wrong direction and was now twelve hours’
journey away, and in the morning the elephant had suddenly reappeared in
the town. The Burmese population had no weapons and were quite helpless
against it. It had already destroyed somebody’s bamboo hut, killed a cow
and raided some fruit-stalls and devoured the stock; also it had met the
municipal rubbish van and, when the driver jumped out and took to his
heels, had turned the van over and inflicted violences upon it.
The Burmese sub-inspector and some Indian constables were waiting for me
in the quarter where the elephant had been seen. It was a very poor
quarter, a labyrinth of squalid bamboo huts, thatched with palmleaf,
winding all over a steep hillside. I remember that it was a cloudy,
stuffy morning at the beginning of the rains. We began questioning the
people as to where the elephant had gone and, as usual, failed to get any
definite information. That is invariably the case in the East; a story
always sounds clear enough at a distance, but the nearer you get to the
scene of events the vaguer it becomes. Some of the people said that the
elephant had gone in one direction, some said that he had gone in
another, some professed not even to have heard of any elephant. I had
almost made up my mind that the whole story was a pack of lies, when we
heard yells a little distance away. There was a loud, scandalized cry of
“Go away, child! Go away this instant!” and an old woman with a switch in
her hand came round the corner of a hut, violently shooing away a crowd
of naked children. Some more women followed, clicking their tongues and
exclaiming; evidently there was something that the children ought not to
have seen. I rounded the hut and saw a man’s dead body sprawling in the
mud. He was an Indian, a black Dravidian coolie, almost naked, and he
could not have been dead many minutes. The people said that the elephant
had come suddenly upon him round the corner of the hut, caught him with
its trunk, put its foot on his back and ground him into the earth. This
was the rainy season and the ground was soft, and his face had scored a
trench a foot deep and a couple of yards long. He was lying on his belly
with arms crucified and head sharply twisted to one side. His face was
coated with mud, the eyes wide open, the teeth bared and grinning with an
expression of unendurable agony. (Never tell me, by the way, that the
dead look peaceful. Most of the corpses I have seen looked devilish.) The
friction of the great beast’s foot had stripped the skin from his back as
neatly as one skins a rabbit. As soon as I saw the dead man I sent an
orderly to a friend’s house nearby to borrow an elephant rifle. I had
already sent back the pony, not wanting it to go mad with fright and
throw me if it smelt the elephant.
The orderly came back in a few minutes with a rifle and five cartridges,
and meanwhile some Burmans had arrived and told us that the elephant was
in the paddy fields below, only a few hundred yards away. As I started
forward practically the whole population of the quarter flocked out of
the houses and followed me. They had seen the rifle and were all shouting
excitedly that I was going to shoot the elephant. They had not shown much
interest in the elephant when he was merely ravaging their homes, but it
was different now that he was going to be shot. It was a bit of fun to
them, as it would be to an English crowd; besides they wanted the meat.
It made me vaguely uneasy. I had no intention of shooting the elephant–I
had merely sent for the rifle to defend myself if necessary–and it is
always unnerving to have a crowd following you. I marched down the hill,
looking and feeling a fool, with the rifle over my shoulder and an
ever-growing army of people jostling at my heels. At the bottom, when you
got away from the huts, there was a metalled road and beyond that a miry
waste of paddy fields a thousand yards across, not yet ploughed but soggy
from the first rains and dotted with coarse grass. The elephant was
standing eight yards from the road, his left side towards us. He took not
the slightest notice of the crowd’s approach. He was tearing up bunches
of grass, beating them against his knees to clean them and stuffing them
into his mouth.
I had halted on the road. As soon as I saw the elephant I knew with
perfect certainty that I ought not to shoot him. It is a serious matter
to shoot a working elephant–it is comparable to destroying a huge and
costly piece of machinery–and obviously one ought not to do it if it can
possibly be avoided. And at that distance, peacefully eating, the
elephant looked no more dangerous than a cow. I thought then and I think
now that his attack of “must” was already passing off; in which case he
would merely wander harmlessly about until the mahout came back and
caught him. Moreover, I did not in the least want to shoot him. I decided
that I would watch him for a little while to make sure that he did not
turn savage again, and then go home.
But at that moment I glanced round at the crowd that had followed me. It
was an immense crowd, two thousand at the least and growing every minute.
It blocked the road for a long distance on either side. I looked at the
sea of yellow faces above the garish clothes-faces all happy and excited
over this bit of fun, all certain that the elephant was going to be shot.
They were watching me as they would watch a conjurer about to perform a
trick. They did not like me, but with the magical rifle in my hands I was
momentarily worth watching. And suddenly I realized that I should have to
shoot the elephant after all. The people expected it of me and I had got
to do it; I could feel their two thousand wills pressing me forward,
irresistibly. And it was at this moment, as I stood there with the rifle
in my hands, that I first grasped the hollowness, the futility of the
white man’s dominion in the East. Here was I, the white man with his gun,
standing in front of the unarmed native crowd–seemingly the leading
actor of the piece; but in reality I was only an absurd puppet pushed to
and fro by the will of those yellow faces behind. I perceived in this
moment that when the white man turns tyrant it is his own freedom that he
destroys. He becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy, the conventionalized
figure of a sahib. For it is the condition of his rule that he shall
spend his life in trying to impress the “natives,” and so in every crisis
he has got to do what the “natives” expect of him. He wears a mask, and
his face grows to fit it. I had got to shoot the elephant. I had
committed myself to doing it when I sent for the rifle. A sahib has got
to act like a sahib; he has got to appear resolute, to know his own mind
and do definite things. To come all that way, rifle in hand, with two
thousand people marching at my heels, and then to trail feebly away,
having done nothing–no, that was impossible. The crowd would laugh at
me. And my whole life, every white man’s life in the East, was one long
struggle not to be laughed at.
But I did not want to shoot the elephant. I watched him beating his bunch
of grass against his knees, with that preoccupied grandmotherly air that
elephants have. It seemed to me that it would be murder to shoot him. At
that age I was not squeamish about killing animals, but I had never shot
an elephant and never wanted to. (Somehow it always seems worse to kill a
LARGE animal.) Besides, there was the beast’s owner to be considered.
Alive, the elephant was worth at least a hundred pounds; dead, he would
only be worth the value of his tusks, five pounds, possibly. But I had
got to act quickly. I turned to some experienced-looking Burmans who had
been there when we arrived, and asked them how the elephant had been
behaving. They all said the same thing: he took no notice of you if you
left him alone, but he might charge if you went too close to him.
It was perfectly clear to me what I ought to do. I ought to walk up to
within, say, twenty-five yards of the elephant and test his behavior. If
he charged, I could shoot; if he took no notice of me, it would be safe
to leave him until the mahout came back. But also I knew that I was going
to do no such thing. I was a poor shot with a rifle and the ground was
soft mud into which one would sink at every step. If the elephant charged
and I missed him, I should have about as much chance as a toad under a
steam-roller. But even then I was not thinking particularly of my own
skin, only of the watchful yellow faces behind. For at that moment, with
the crowd watching me, I was not afraid in the ordinary sense, as I would
have been if I had been alone. A white man mustn’t be frightened in front
of “natives”; and so, in general, he isn’t frightened. The sole thought
in my mind was that if anything went wrong those two thousand Burmans
would see me pursued, caught, trampled on and reduced to a grinning
corpse like that Indian up the hill. And if that happened it was quite
probable that some of them would laugh. That would never do.
There was only one alternative. I shoved the cartridges into the magazine
and lay down on the road to get a better aim. The crowd grew very still,
and a deep, low, happy sigh, as of people who see the theatre curtain go
up at last, breathed from innumerable throats. They were going to have
their bit of fun after all. The rifle was a beautiful German thing with
cross-hair sights. I did not then know that in shooting an elephant one
would shoot to cut an imaginary bar running from ear-hole to ear-hole. I
ought, therefore, as the elephant was sideways on, to have aimed straight
at his ear-hole, actually I aimed several inches in front of this,
thinking the brain would be further forward.
When I pulled the trigger I did not hear the bang or feel the kick–one
never does when a shot goes home–but I heard the devilish roar of glee
that went up from the crowd. In that instant, in too short a time, one
would have thought, even for the bullet to get there, a mysterious,
terrible change had come over the elephant. He neither stirred nor fell,
but every line of his body had altered. He looked suddenly stricken,
shrunken, immensely old, as though the frighfful impact of the bullet had
paralysed him without knocking him down. At last, after what seemed a
long time–it might have been five seconds, I dare say–he sagged
flabbily to his knees. His mouth slobbered. An enormous senility seemed
to have settled upon him. One could have imagined him thousands of years
old. I fired again into the same spot. At the second shot he did not
collapse but climbed with desperate slowness to his feet and stood weakly
upright, with legs sagging and head drooping. I fired a third time. That
was the shot that did for him. You could see the agony of it jolt his
whole body and knock the last remnant of strength from his legs. But in
falling he seemed for a moment to rise, for as his hind legs collapsed
beneath him he seemed to tower upward like a huge rock toppling, his
trunk reaching skyward like a tree. He trumpeted, for the first and only
time. And then down he came, his belly towards me, with a crash that
seemed to shake the ground even where I lay.
I got up. The Burmans were already racing past me across the mud. It was
obvious that the elephant would never rise again, but he was not dead. He
was breathing very rhythmically with long rattling gasps, his great mound
of a side painfully rising and falling. His mouth was wide open–I could
see far down into caverns of pale pink throat. I waited a long time for
him to die, but his breathing did not weaken. Finally I fired my two
remaining shots into the spot where I thought his heart must be. The
thick blood welled out of him like red velvet, but still he did not die.
His body did not even jerk when the shots hit him, the tortured breathing
continued without a pause. He was dying, very slowly and in great agony,
but in some world remote from me where not even a bullet could damage him
further. I felt that I had got to put an end to that dreadful noise. It
seemed dreadful to see the great beast Lying there, powerless to move and
yet powerless to die, and not even to be able to finish him. I sent back
for my small rifle and poured shot after shot into his heart and down his
throat. They seemed to make no impression. The tortured gasps continued
as steadily as the ticking of a clock.
In the end I could not stand it any longer and went away. I heard later
that it took him half an hour to die. Burmans were bringing dahs and
baskets even before I left, and I was told they had stripped his body
almost to the bones by the afternoon.
Afterwards, of course, there were endless discussions about the shooting
of the elephant. The owner was furious, but he was only an Indian and
could do nothing. Besides, legally I had done the right thing, for a mad
elephant has to be killed, like a mad dog, if its owner fails to control
it. Among the Europeans opinion was divided. The older men said I was
right, the younger men said it was a damn shame to shoot an elephant for
killing a coolie, because an elephant was worth more than any damn
Coringhee coolie. And afterwards I was very glad that the coolie had been
killed; it put me legally in the right and it gave me a sufficient
pretext for shooting the elephant. I often wondered whether any of the
others grasped that I had done it solely to avoid looking a fool.
Andy O - After reading your story, I wept.
The destruction of the bamboo hut and the rubbish van and then to kill a helpless cow (please let us know the fate of the cow - was the cow left to rot or was the meat properly harvested) are just more evidence of the danger posed by elephants.
Andy O, Andy O, Andy O, do not cry for this beast, do not think of it as murder. You did what needed to be done. As Robb O states; think of what last went through that poor cows mind (probably an udder) or the pleasures that van would have brought to its owner. This elephant (probably a painting elephant) deserved to die. As you’ve all read in my last post; my wife almost died because of one of these creatures. As Seebey 1 states (post 45) “they can plan and EXECUTEâ€. I wasn’t going to tell my personal story, but after reading your traumatic affair, I feel I must.
I was travelling on an expedition with my colleague Dr Art Vandelay near Wang Saphung when we stopped and set up camp for the night. I decided to do a little painting, so I set my easel under a large pomegranate tree. I had just dipped my brush when the earth shook and the trees started to shake. A large male elephant charged out of the bushes and knocked me to the ground. Before I knew what hit me, it had my paint brush and was going for my titanium white. This was not enough for this mammoth demon, as it looked down on my poor helpless body lying under it; I swear I saw it smile as it stepped onto both my legs. When I woke in the hospital in Bangkok I was told how the animal used my unconscious body to paint a picture of a fallen pomegranate which fallen from the tree during the mêlée. It was there, in that dark dank Bangkok hospital that I was informed that both my legs were amputated at the waist. From that day I have been cruelly branded with the nickname you see above.