Comment monter sur un éléphant

«An elephant is far the most difficult animal to sit that I have ever been on. You feel at first rather as if you were in a light boat lying at anchor in seas a little choppy after a capful of wind—but the sensation soon wears off and you learn to dispose yourself with ease and grace upon the hoodah, and above all not to seize hold of the side bars when the elephant sits down, for they are only hooked and jerk out, landing you, probably (as they nearly landed me) in the dust a good many feet below. We soon discovered that the great tip for good elephantship is to grasp the front bar the moment you get on, for he gets up from in front (and very quickly too for he’s doesn’t like kneeling at all) and the problem is how not to fall over his tail. It’s a little disconcerting to find that an Indian, when he wishes to ascribe ideal movement to a woman, calls her “elephant gaited.” “An eye like a gazelle, a waist like a lion, an a gait like an elephant.”» (Gertrude Bell).