Testing the elephants' gangway

In days gone by Wirth’s Circus travelled regularly across the Tasman for their New Zealand tours, usually by passenger ship, and one remembers that, as the time for their voyaging approached, there was a general hue and cry to establish the whereabouts of the ‘elephant stage’, a massive gangway especially made for the embarkation and disembarkation of the circus elephants. It was said that the ‘leading hand’ elephant always tested the reliability of the contraption by a couple of resounding thumps of a forefoot before entrusting his weight to it, after which there was no hesitation on the part of his colleagues in following him over the brow.

- Douglas F Gardner, The Union Steam Ship Company Steam Ships, Wellington, 1982, p.33

(Extract of Wirth Brothers advertisement from Wanganui Chronicle, 22 February 1916)