HAVE ELEPHANTS SECOND SIGHT?

Evening Star, Issue 20309, 18 October 1929, Page 5

HAVE ELEPHANTS SECOND SIGHT?

•• THE CLEVEREST OF ALL THE ANIMALS ” I had a talk with Keeper Church, of the London Zoo, about the f ‘ second sight ” of elephants (writes a special representative of the ‘Evening Standard’). It arose out of a remarkable Toronto story of an elephant which, when passing the spot where her old circus companion was killed thirty-four years ago, “ went down on her knees ... and made repeated demonstrations of sorrow.” “ There’s something uncanny about elephants,” said Keeper Church. “ I’ve worked with them for twenty years, and: they sometimes get me beat. A kind of second sight, I suppose you’d call it. A funny thing about them is the way they take dislikes to certain people. Even the quitest of them show it sometimes. You can sense it as soon as a visitor they don’t like comes near them. Quite likely they have never seen the person before. “ Good memories? I should say they have. And they remember the visitors who feed them. One visitor brings fruit in a coloured basket. They always spot that basket and know what’s coming to them. I think the elephants are the cleverest of ell the animals—though some are brainiei and quicker than others.” He threw down a penny to one. The coin was auickly retrieved. But when the animal thrust his trunk towards Church, the keeper withheld the compensating biscuit. Like a, flash the tip of the tongue was back with the coin concealed. Not until the biscuit had been firmly grasped was the penny restored.