| OCR Text |
Show When King Diet! in India, Elephant Chose New Ruler The importance of elephants irt f Indian history dates from the-Vedic the-Vedic period, when they were India's In-dia's king-makers. They were supposed sup-posed to be gifted with an unerring unerr-ing instinct to spot the real scion of the royal blood. Whenever a king died childless, the royal elephant ele-phant was called upon to solve the difficulty. He was gaily caparisoned and given a garland to put around the neck of whomsoever he chose in his rambles for the quest of a successor. suc-cessor. Wandering through the hills and dales, the elephant would come upon the rightful ruler of his choice, and put the garland around his neck. Thus, sometimes-a sometimes-a beggar's bowl was exchanged , for a kingly crown. In this way was the new king found, and the courtiers who followed fol-lowed the royal animal flocked to his standard and swore fealty to him. |
