Page:Ancient India as described by Megasthenês and Arrian.djvu/137

118 manger, and makes by this device their fine scent be, as it were, a relish to his food. He strews also a good quantity of them as litter over his stall, for he loves to have his sleep made sweet and pleasant. The Indian elephants were nine cubits in height and five in breadth. The largest elephants in all the land were those called the Praisian, and next to these the Taxilan.^ Fragm. LIII. ^lian, Hist. Anim. III. 46. 0/a White Elephant. (Of. Fragm. xxxvi. 11, xxxvii. 11.) An Indian elephant-trainer fell in with a white elephant-calf, which he brought when still quite young to his home, where he reared it, and gra- dually made it quite tame and rode upon it. He became much attached to the creature, which loved him in return, and by its affection requited him for its maintenance. Now the king of the Indians, having heard of this elephant, wanted to take it ; but the owner, jealous of the love it had for him, and grieving much, no doubt, to think that another should become its master, refused to give it away, and made ofp at once to the % This fragment is ascribed to Megasthen^s both on account of the matter of it, and because it was undoubtedly from Megasthen^s thkt ^lian borrowed the narrative pre- ceding it (Fragm. xxxviii.) and that following it (Fragm. mr.).— Schwanbeck. Digitized by Google