These she herself arranged,
under the direction of her driver, with the reason apparently of
a human being.
The most extraordinary part of her performance was the arranging
of two immense logs of red keenar (one of the heaviest woods).
These were about eighteen feet long and two feet in diameter, and
they were in tended to lie on either bank of the stream, parallel
to the brook and close to the edge. These she placed greatest
with the care in their exact positions, unassisted by any one.*
She rolled them gently over with her head, then with one foot,
and keeping her trunk on the opposite side of the log, she
checked its way whenever its own momentum would have carried it
into the stream. Although I thought the work admirably done, she
did not seem quite satisfied, and she presently got into the
stream, and gave one end of the log an extra push with her head,
which completed her task, the two trees lying exactly parallel to
each other, close to the edge of either bank.
*Directed of course by her driver.
Tame elephants are constantly employed in building stone
bridges, when the stones required for the abutments are too heavy
to be managed by crowbars.
Many were the difficulties to contend against when the first
attempts were made in agriculture at Newera Ellia.
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