The Wonders of the Jungle.
by Prince Sarath Ghosh.
Book One.
PREFACE
One of the great thinkers of the world has said that all the sciences are embodied in natural history. Hence natural history should be taught to a child from an early age.
Perhaps the best method of teaching it is to set forth the characteristics of animals in the form of a narrative. Then the child reads the narrative with pleasure and almost as a story, not as a tedious "lesson."
I have followed that method in the Wonders of the Jungle. The present work (Book One) is intended to be a supplementary reader for the earlier grades in grammar schools. If it be found useful, I shall write one or two more books in progressive order for the use of higher grades.
In Book One I have depicted only such wild animals as appeal to the interest of young children, and even to their sympathy and love. In subsequent books I shall describe the animals that prey upon others.
As those animals are not lovable, it would be better for the child to read about them a year or two later. But even to those animals I shall be just, and shall depict their good qualities as well as their preying habits. How many people know that the very worst animal, the tiger, is a better husband and father than many men? Or that the ferocity of the tigress is prompted entirely by her maternal instinct--and that in every case of unusual ferocity yet recorded it was afterward found that there was a helpless cub somewhere near?
Hence in subsequent books I shall enter more fully into the causes of animal instincts and characteristics--their loves and their hates and their fears.
Regarding the scheme of Book One, the animals are described in their daily life, and the main scientific facts and principles concerning each animal are woven into the narrative as a part of that daily life.
But while teaching science to the child in that pleasant form, a few other purposes have also been kept in view:--
1. To cultivate the child"s imagination. True imagination is the ability to visualize mentally the realities of life, not what is unreal--for which it is so often mistaken. Hence in this book the child is helped to visualize the animals in their actual haunts, and to see each incident as it actually happens.
2. To cultivate the child"s reasoning faculty. The child is encouraged at every step to think and to reason why the animal does certain things; _e.g._ why the elephant does not drink directly with its mouth, but has to squirt the water into it with the trunk.
3. To teach a moral from the study of animals. The whole of Creation is one immense and beautiful pattern: so the child may well be trained to see the pattern in this also. And as a practical benefit from the study of animals, the child may learn thereby the value of certain qualities, such as obedience, discipline, and good citizenship--_e.g._ as in the remarkable case of the elephant, the buffalo, and the flamingo, as described in the text. In this regard I have kept in mind the very useful suggestions formulated a few years ago by the Moral Education League of Great Britain, under the patronage of Queen Mary, five of whose children at that time ranged in age from seven to fifteen. One of the functions of education is to present to the child the n.o.blest and the most elevated of ideals. I have sought to do that in almost every chapter.
I have to acknowledge my obligation to the New York Kindergarten a.s.sociation for its valuable cooperation in putting this book through a practical test. The Kindergarten a.s.sociation on more than one occasion provided me with a large audience of children, ranging in age from six to nine, ex-pupils of the a.s.sociation, who are now in the public schools.
THE WONDERS OF THE JUNGLE
CHAPTER I
The Midnight Pool
My dear, I shall tell you all about the wonders of the jungle. You have seen many animals in the zoo or in a circus--elephants, bears, lions, tigers, leopards, and many others. But the jungle is the place where these animals live before they are brought to the zoo or the circus.
In fact, _jungle_ really means a _wild place_; that is, a place where trees and bushes grow quite wild, so that men never cut down the trees or clear away the bushes. That is the natural home for all sorts of animals.
Now I am going to tell you about the wonderful way in which they live there with their families, as we do in our homes; for the Papas and Mammas among the animals are just as fond of their children as ours are. So you must _imagine_ that you are going into the jungle with me, so that I can show you everything. You see, it is just like a game of _pretending_, that we are going to play.
There is actually a place in the jungle where you can see all the animals at once. In fact, that place is so wonderful that King George and Queen Mary of England went to see it; that was a few years ago, when they went to India, which is a far-away country. For in India there is a huge jungle where many thousands of animals live.
So you must _pretend_ that I am taking you to the Royal party, and that you are sitting with the King and Queen and all the fine men and lovely ladies; and we are watching the animals, while I tell you all about them.
First, I must tell you that it is midnight, and all the animals are coming to a stream of water to drink. This stream is a river about twice as wide as a large street in your home town. We are sitting on the bank, on one side of the stream; and the animals are coming to drink on the bank on the other side.
"But," you may say, "will not the animals see us across the stream, and get frightened and run away?"
That is quite true. But the King and Queen had thought of that. So they ordered a lot of men to put a large net on their side of the stream, just in front of them, and then to cover the net with twigs and leaves so cleverly that the animals thought the leaves were a part of the jungle, and did not see the people on the other side of the net.
So the King and Queen, and you and I, can peep quietly through the leaves and watch the animals. Almost all wild animals drink at midnight; so we shall see them now.
Where will the animals come from? You see the stream before us; well, on the other side of it is the jungle, where the animals live. Right in front of us we see a gap in the jungle close to the bank. That gap was made by _elephants_ by beating down the bushes with their feet.
They made it long ago to come to the water, and now they use it every night. In fact, it is known among the jungle folks as the _Elephant Path_; for no other animal would dare to use it before the elephants did.
The elephants, being the biggest of all animals, are the _lords of the jungle_; so they have the right to come first to drink. They are also the wisest of all animals. You have seen many kinds of animals--elephants, horses, dogs, monkeys, and others--do funny tricks in a circus. Now, all these animals except the elephant have to be _taught_ to do tricks; the elephant is the only animal that can think out a trick for itself.
Of course in a circus there is always a teacher, or trainer, to show even the elephant how to do tricks; but in the jungle the elephant can find out how to do things for itself.
Very soon I shall tell you about the tricks which the elephant actually does in the jungle; and as you hear about them, you must _think_! Why? Because then you will know _why_ the elephant does these things--and that will show you how clever _you_ can be!
_Elephants Drink First--but Down Stream_
First let us watch the elephants as they come to the river through the gap in the jungle.
See! They come one at a time, _one behind another;_ for the gap is not big enough for more than one at the same time. The elephant is so big that it can get through the jungle only in this way.
First come a number of _bull elephants_. They are the Papa elephants; you can always tell them by the _huge tusks_ they have. The bulls come first, in case there are any enemies waiting to hurt their children; for then the bulls can drive off the enemies.
As each bull elephant comes through the gap, you see him turn to our right, which is _down_ the stream--that is, the way the water flows.
You see the first one walk along the bank that way, and the second comes after him, then the third, and so on.
But why do they walk along the bank? To make room, of course, for all their friends who are still coming from behind. In this way about a dozen bull elephants come ahead of all the others.
After them you see the _cow elephants_, also in a line, one behind another. They are the Mamma elephants; and nearly every one of them has a baby elephant trotting in _front_ of her. You have often seen the ordinary cow that gives you milk; when she goes to graze in the field, her baby, or calf, trots by her side.
But the Mamma elephant is much wiser, and always tells her baby to toddle in _front_ of her, in case any one comes suddenly to hurt or steal the baby. For a tiger sometimes wants to pounce on the baby from the side, grab it quickly, and carry it away. But he cannot do it if the baby is right in front of its Mamma; for then she will drive him off with her tusks, even if they are not quite so big as the tusks that the Papa elephants have.
As the Mammas reach the bank, each with her baby, you see them also walk along the bank down stream in a long line.
After all the Mammas and babies have come, you see another set of bull elephants coming out of the jungle. Why? Because some enemy might try to attack the Mammas and the babies from the _back_; so these bull elephants are there to guard them. You see, the Mammas and the babies are _always in the middle_, safe from all harm.
When all the elephants have reached the stream, they stand in line and face the water. All these elephants belong to _one herd_; you can count about a hundred. A herd of elephants is really a _republic_, like the United States of America, and has a President, who is the wisest bull in the herd.
In another book I shall tell you how the elephants choose their President, and make laws, and keep order in the herd; how they choose some strong bulls among them to act as _policemen_ in the herd, and catch and punish any naughty elephant who becomes a _rogue_; and how, if two elephants start quarrelling and fighting like naughty boys, the police elephants have to catch and punish both of them. Also, I shall tell you how the President has to lead the herd every day when they go in search of food, so that they will have plenty to eat.
And in the jungle, as there are other elephant herds and sometimes two herds find the same feeding ground, and then start quarrelling and fighting as to who found it first, it is the duty of the President to keep his own herd away from the two that are fighting, and not mix in the fight in any way. All these wonderful things and many others you will read in the other book, when you are a little older.
But let us see what the President has to do when the whole herd is standing in line, facing the water. He is at the bottom of the line, far down stream; so he looks up along the line to see that all are ready. Then he gives the signal for them to begin drinking; he does this by dipping his trunk into the water. Then the second one sees him do it, and does the same; in that way each elephant higher up the line sees that the next one below him has started drinking, so he too does the same. Soon they are all drinking, as you see in the picture at the beginning of this book.
But why does the President have to give the signal to begin? Why is it that any elephant, anywhere along the line, cannot start drinking, just as he or she pleases? Think!