d from foot to foot.

"Ten days," said Deesa, "you will work and haul and root the trees as
Chihun here shall order you. Take up Chihun and set him on your neck!"
Moti Guj curled the tip of his trunk, Chihun put his foot there, and was
swung on to the neck. Deesa handed Chihun the heavy _ankus_--the iron
elephant goad.

Chihun thumped Moti Guj's bald head as a paver thumps a curbstone.

Moti Guj trumpeted.

"Be still, hog of the backwoods! Chihun's your mahout for ten days. And
now bid me good-by, beast after mine own heart. Oh, my lord, my king!
Jewel of all created elephants, lily of the herd, preserve your honored
health; be virtuous. Adieu!"

Moti Guj lapped his trunk round Deesa and swung him into the air twice.
That was his way of bidding him good-by.

"He'll work now," said Deesa to the planter. "Have I leave to go?"

The planter nodded, and Deesa dived into the woods. Moti Guj went back
to haul stumps.

Chihun was very kind to him, but he felt unhappy and forlorn for all
that. Chihun gave him a ball of spices, and tickled him under the chin,
and Chihun's little baby cooed to him after work was over, and Chihun's
wife called him a darling; but Moti Guj was a bachelor by instinct, as
Deesa was. He did not understand the domestic emotions. He wanted the
light of his universe back again--the drink and the drunken slumber, the
savage beatings and the savage caresses.

None the less he worked well, and the planter wondered. Deesa had
wandered along the roads till he met a marriage procession of his own
caste, and, drinking, dancing, and tippling, had drifted with it past
all knowledge of the lapse of time.

The morning of the eleventh day dawned, and there returned no Deesa.
Moti Guj was loosed from his ropes for the daily stint. He swung clear,
looked round, shrugged his shoulders, and began to walk away, as one
having business elsewhere.

"Hi! ho! Come back you!" shouted Chihun. "Come back and put me on your
neck, misborn mountain! Return, splendor of the hill-sides! Adornment of
all India, heave to, or I'll bang every toe off your fat forefoot!"

Moti Guj gurgled gently, but did not obey. Chihun ran after him with a
rope and caught him up. Moti Guj put his ears forward, and Chihun knew
what that meant, though he tried to carry it off with high words.

"None of your nonsense with me," said he. "To your pickets, devil-son!"

"Hrrump!" said Moti Guj, and that was all--that and the forebent ears.

Mot