Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 4).djvu/629

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ZIG ZAGS AT THE ZOO

by Arthur Morrison and J. H. Shepherd.


S uffa Culli, Jung Perchad, Jingo, and Solomon—where are their enemies? What human thing so base as nurse ill-will for the genial elephant? The jolly elephant—the meek, all-obedient elephant—the elephant, who provides the world with ivory, and Sunday-school anecdotes, and rides for twopence! Though I turn from my fellow-man—having found him out—though every other thing that crawls, runs, or flies revolt me, still may I keep my faith in the elephant; for assuredly he will be worthy thereof. He, almost alone among living creatures, has never betrayed my trust. I believed in the lion—the picture books of infancy taught me of his valour, his magnanimity, and all the rest; but the lion has turned out an impostor. I believed in the camel—his intelligence, his long-suffering docility; but the camel is a humbug. In the elephant I may still believe. All those charming stories, wherein the elephant never forgets an injury, nor is ungrateful