One evening on our way back to camp, we thought that we would ride our elephants ourselves, and told the mahouts to get down.
Some of the mahouts are cruel, and make their heads sore with the goads, but I think kindness is best.
I have made friends with the great beasts, often with big ones that the mahouts said were savage-tempered and dangerous.
The men obeyed clumsily, being fishermen by occupation and mahouts by compulsion.
Too late he learned that the mahouts he had secretly engaged had misunderstood his instructions and had stationed themselves near the main entrance to the arena!
It is true I have to do as the mahouts tell me, but they treat me kindly, they feed me and I never have to go thirsty, and when my toe nails get too long they smooth them down for me with a rough brick.
And indeed the Indian mahouts consider their elephants almost like children.
Some of the unarmed mahouts were also reluctant, and shouted their fears.
It is strange that in these encounters the wild elephants made no attempt to attack or dislodge the mahouts or the cooroowes, who rode on the tame ones.
Footnote 1: The principal sound by which the mahouts in Ceylon direct the motions of the elephants is a repetition, with various modulations, of the words ur-re!
In the older individuals in Ceylon, this is less apparent: and in captivity the hair appears to be altogether removed by the custom of the mahouts to rub their skin daily with oil and a rough lump of burned clay.
It has been said that the mahouts die young, owing to some supposed injury to the spinal column from the peculiar motion of the elephant; but this remark does not apply to those in Ceylon, who are healthy, and as long lived as other men.
Driven into a stockade, the tamed elephants close in {195} on him, and the mahouts get him well chained before he knows what has happened.
If the tiger is marked into a particular bush, the line may be halted, and the howdah elephants alone be taken up to engage him; but until the mahouts have thorough confidence in the guns a fight is better avoided.
So the elephants were brought out, and the mahouts duly admonished upon the dangers they would run if they attempted any treachery.
When a herd of wild elephants is secured within a stockade, or kheddah, the mahouts ride trained elephants amongst the wild ones without fear, though any one of the wild ones might, by a movement of its trunk, dislodge the man.
The Doctor cross questioned the mahouts and told off the elephants for the party; then there was a talk with the native shikaris and arrangements made for the beat, and at an early hour all retired to rest.
Mr. Sanderson speaks of mahouts as "rascals more often than not," and as "invariably superstitious and ignorant.
Some mahouts are quite skilful in this pattern work.
The mahoutswere hurried down into the hold, and each, seated on his beast, made him "break step" so to speak.
Mahouts also believe that when a wild elephant is coming downhill and cannot reach forward with his trunk to sound a dangerous foot-hold, he breaks a sapling and, holding it like an alpen-stock, probes and feels his way.
Illustration:] While some mahouts hint vaguely that the elephant came to India from the farther East, it is an accepted belief that the camel came from the West, i.
In the matter of food and stimulants, however, mahouts have no conscience, and steal without a qualm.
The worst was when the elephant first shipped died in his place, of vexation, mahouts would say, who believe the creatures only die when they are so inclined.
Steel, agree that mahouts invariably make the animals' comfort subservient to their own.
Mahouts also claim that he is the only animal in man's service who is told in so many words to eat and sleep.
Mahouts think nothing of securing an animal so that one side is exposed day and night to wind or rain.
Sometimes for state occasions an animal with poor or elementary tusks is fitted with a jury pair, a feat of dentistry of whichmahouts are proud.
Their mahouts seemed to approach them with great caution, and, on hearing a step, they turned round as far as their chains would allow, and lashed fiercely with their trunks.
There are hardly any elephants that measure ten feet in a direct perpendicular, although the mahouts pretend to fictitious heights by measuring with a tape or cord from the spine, including the curve of the body.
One of the mahouts dismounted from his elephant, and struck it with an axe upon the head.
Immediately afterwards, a shout from one of the mahouts upon a scouting elephant informed us that the tiger had crossed the path and had gone forward, having thus escaped from the beat!
The mahouts are exceedingly careless, and require much supervision; the only method to ensure attention is to hold them responsible and to deduct so many rupees from their pay should the backs of their animals be unsound.
We had been advancing at the rate of about half a mile an hour, the elephants almost "marking time" when in about the centre of the jungle one of the mahouts raised his arm as a signal and halted his elephant.
The mahouts are very obstinate, and insist upon native medicines, their famous lotion being a decoction of Mhowa blossoms, which in my opinion aggravated the inflammation of the wound.
Two or three of the mahouts shouted, "The tiger's behind, we must go back and take a longer beat.
The mahouts steadied their animals, brought them again into a correct line, and the advance continued.
This was successful, as shortly afterwards we heard the shouts of the mahouts on the scouting elephants, who reported that the tiger had gone away at great speed across the intervening ground towards the original retreat.
The mahouts suggested that we should not disturb him, but give him time to sleep, and then beat for him in the afternoon.
Here we disturbed a colony of pigs, but the four mahouts being Mahommedans I did not fire.
What appeared to me very wonderful, was that the wild ones never molested the mahouts or cooroowes who rode on the backs of the tame elephants.
I yelled until my own ear-drums seemed to be bursting and my lungs ached from the pressure on the water in them, and after what seemed an eternity one of the mahouts on shore heard me.
I saw all the mahouts gather together in one place and stare at us and talk.
However wild it might be it would certainly include the fact that two white men had ridden to Yasmini's palace on the Maharajah's favorite elephant after having been fished out of the river by mahouts at the elephant's bathing ghat.
The mahouts and hunters smelt more or less of civilization and were convinced for their part that the disposition of the little light-coloured elephant was beyond redemption.
But most of the mahouts and catchers noticed the rapidity with which the little Muztagh acquired weight and strength.
The mahouts had planned it in sheer boyishness; and to their mountain hearts it meant something like the clown-play in a western circus.
Without being seen or heard themselves, they went close enough to learn that she was making recovery from great exhaustion; and that themahouts were caring for an elephant unable to travel by reason of a bad wound.
Gunpat Rao was one of the finest young elephants in captivity; one of the swiftest in the caravan; but the mahouts knew he could not think a trick!
These mahouts had trained ears; and they listened--computing the stranger's rate of speed.
The mahouts assented, as Ram Yaksahn smoked a moment.
As time went by, the attraction of his mysterious nature inflamed the mahouts with interest; and also with concern--for he was a fearsome fighter.
They answer their individualmahouts like a man's own fingers.
Kudrat Sharif spoke softly; and the mahouts of the Chief Commissioner's stockades assented.
But Mitha Baba's reply was in the very oldest language of India--one even the mahouts know only a very little of.
It is right for you to know," the master-mahout went on, "that mahouts are a kind of men by themselves apart.
The mahouts turned their elephants off on either side, the huge animals rushing across the country; and the foot-soldiers fled back into the city, where many were cut down, others escaping in the track of the elephants.
Gorgeously-ornamented cloths covered the backs of the huge animals, while the mahouts sat on their necks, to direct them where to go and what to do.
We have taken one of the Indian mahouts into our confidence, and he has promised his aid; the elephant of which he is in charge is a docile beast, and his driver has taught him many tricks.
The above list will hopefully give you a few useful examples demonstrating the appropriate usage of "mahouts" in a variety of sentences. We hope that you will now be able to make sentences using this word.
