They encompassed the tree where I was with their trunks
extended and their eyes all fixed upon me. At this frightful
spectacle I remained immoveable, and was so much frightened that my
bow and arrows fell out of my hand.
My fears were not in vain; for after the elephants had stared upon
me for some time, one of the largest of them put his trunk round
the root of the tree, and pulled so strong that he 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: then he
put himself at the head of the rest, who followed him in troops,
and carried me to a place where he laid me down on the ground, and
retired with all his companions. Conceive, if you can, the
condition I was in: I thought myself to be in a dream; at last,
after having lain some time, and seeing the elephants gone, I got
up, and found I was upon a long and broad hill, covered all over
with the bones and teeth of elephants. I confess to you that this
furnished me with abundance of reflections. I admired the instinct
of those animals; I doubted not but that this 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.
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