This adventure shows how easily lives might be lost in hunting the
wild buffalo, about which the herdsmen who know him best have told me
what should, perhaps, be better known, were it only to prevent
misunderstandings. There is not the slightest need for war between
buffaloes and us. They are not natural enemies, like the tiger. They
are not even troublesome to tame, like the deer.
"Though terrible to kill, they are easy to catch," say the herdsmen
familiar with their haunts. "You have only to decoy them into a pen,
and once there they can sell for a price at once, like those born in
the village. They are more valuable," said one herdsman.
"But the taming?"
"That's nothing. Let them starve till they are weak. Then feed them
up, slowly. Make them feel they are being fed by men."
"They can see that."
"No, for you generally bandage their eyes. You have to speak to them
and not leave them to eat as if they found the food themselves. Let
them know they owe it to you."
"You don't think of that at all," said another man. "Neither do they.
This is what happens. There's generally a lot of them, like a herd.
Some would be dead, before others were weak. If you just flung the
food in anyhow, the weaklings would be the last to get it. You keep an
eye on them, so as not to lose any; and whenever you see that one is
weak, you feed that one."
"It comes to the same thing," rejoined the man who spoke first. "They
learn that men are their friends, and then they'll do anything you
want."
"Do they work willingly?"
"Who ever did? They do what they have to, like other people. A
buffalo is so mighty that he hardly needs to make an effort to pull
the plough. The one new caught and tamed does as well as the rest."
"Why is he worth more?"
"He isn't," said the other man, quoting figures. An argument followed,
and in the end they agreed. A newly-tamed herd might sell for less per
head than village-born cattle, if the wild ones caught included more
old animals and calves. Compare contemporaries, and the wild one is
the better.
"Why?"
Various reasons were suggested, including one that was oddly
expressed. "The wild animal is the more vigorous, because he has never
been spoiled by working. Think how different I would have been if I
had never had to work for my living!"
This was absurd. Till we came here, with our commercial creed that
money makes the man, education in Burma was universal and free to the
poor, and, however it be in England, where factory workers breed in
slums and breathe polluted air, in Burma the working man lives mostly
in the fields, and is sturdier, and often more sensible, than the
idler. The herdsmen reluctantly admitted this; and it led to a
digression.
In a Socratic way, I explained the gospel of work, with half-and-half
acceptance as long as I quoted only Chinese maxims and examples; but,
happening to hint that the English also had that to teach the East, I
spoiled the lesson. There was a general laugh. "When do the English
work?" Then one asked the other: "Did you ever see an Englishman
working?" They said to each other that the only Englishmen who worked
were one or two, whom the others did not speak to, but treated like
the Pagoda-slaves of native Burma. We returned to the buffaloes.
"Why is the wild one the better?"
"He is stronger, and fresher, and quieter."
"Quieter?"
"Yes. He thinks of men, women and children as his feeders, and will
never hurt anybody, and a little child can lead him."
"A child can drive the village cattle."
"The wild ones tamed are safest of all." (It should be noted that the
domestic buffalo is dangerous occasionally, and people are sometimes
hurt or killed by them.)
"Don't they notice that men caught them?"
"They're not clever enough for that."
"Don't they try to escape?"
"Never. Why should they? They have all they want. It is our business
to keep them contented, and it's easy."
"Their calves are at times obstreperous," a man added, after a pause,
and the others agreed, but said, "All you need do, at the worst, is to
cut their horns, that is, cut off the tips."
"Why not do that to all the calves? There's somebody killed or hurt by
buffaloes every year in Burma."
"The glory of a buffalo is his horns. It would be wrong, because it
would not be natural to blunt them. We would never do it unless we
could not help it, when a particular beast is bad."
"It's too much bother, I suppose."
"No, it's easy. But it does not look natural. The buffalo with his
horns blunted is disfigured, and seems to feel it."
"No, no, it's not natural at all," said one after the other, with
emphasis.
"How do you hunt the buffalo?"
"We never hunt the buffalo. No Burman ever did. At any rate, none ever
does now. It is much safer and easier to catch and tame them; and it
pays better."
A buffalo went by as our talk was ending; and on its withers was
sitting a little boy of six or seven years of age, drumming merrily on
its broad neck with his heels. At sight of us, he signified to it, by
slaps and shouts, to move aside, so as not to splash us; and the big
buffalo gently obeyed.