Thus has Nature formed him not only the greatest in size, but the most
gentle and the most easily taught. Now if I were going to write about
the tractability and aptitude to learn amongst those of India, AEthiopia,
and Libya, I should probably appear to be concocting a tale and acting
the braggart, or to be telling a falsehood respecting the nature of the
animal founded on a mere report, all which it behoves a philosopher, and
most of all one who is an ardent lover of truth, not to do. But what I
have seen myself, and what others have described as having occurred at
Rome, this I have chosen to relate, selecting a few facts out of many,
to show the particular nature of those creatures. The elephant when
tamed is an animal most gentle and most easily led to do whatever he is
directed. And by way of showing honour to time, I will first narrate
events of the oldest date. Caesar Germanicus, the nephew of Tiberius,
exhibited once a public show, wherein there were many full-grown
elephants, male and female, and some of their breed born in this
country. When their limbs were beginning to become firm, a person
familiar with such animals instructed them by a strange and surpassing
method of teaching; using only gentleness and kindness, and adding to
his mild lessons the bait of pleasant and varied food. By this means he
led them by degrees to throw off all wildness, and, as it were, to
desert to a state of civilisation, conducting themselves in a manner
almost human. He taught them neither to be excited on hearing the pipe,
nor to be disturbed by the beat of drum, but to be soothed by the sounds
of the reed, and to endure unmusical noises and the clatter of feet from
persons while marching; and they were trained to feel no fear of a mass
of men, nor to be enraged at the infliction of blows, not even when
compelled to twist their limbs and to bend them like a stage-dancer, and
this too although endowed with strength and might. And there is in this
a very noble addition to nature, not to conduct themselves in a
disorderly manner and disobediently towards the instructions of man; for
after the dancing-master had made them expert, and they had learnt their
lessons accurately, they did not belie the labour of his instruction
whenever a necessity and opportunity called upon them to exhibit what
they had been taught. For the whole troop came forward from this and
that side of the theatre, and divided themselves into parties: they
advanced