Which reminds me of a story ...

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Farewell to the Lion Man of Chelsea

Socialite who bought big cat in Harrods in the 1960s and famously walked it around West London before setting it free in Kenya and being reunited a year later dies aged 76

  • Chelsea-based socialite John Rendall and his friend Anthony 'Ace' Bourke bought a lion cub from Harrods

  • Christian was a regular sight in London as he was taken for walks along King's Road by the conservationist

  • Lion was later returned to the wild in Kenya after growing out of Mr Rendall's furniture store, Sophistocat

  • But lion recognised his old master and bounded up to him for hug when he visited in extraordinary video

A touching tail, and one that brings to mind this one:

While on holiday in Kenya and walking through the bush a man comes across an elephant standing with one leg raised in the air. The elephant seems distressed so the man approaches very carefully. He gets down on one knee and inspects the bottom of the elephant's foot only to find a large thorn deeply embedded. As carefully and as gently as he can he removes the thorn and the elephant gingerly puts its foot down. The elephant turns to face the man and with a rather stern look on its face, stares at him. For a good ten minutes the man stands frozen - thinking of nothing else but being trampled.

Eventually the elephant turns and walks away.

For years after, the man often remembers and ponders the events of that day. Years later the man is walking through the zoo with his son. As they approach the elephant enclosure, one of the elephants turns towards them and, trumpeting loudly, rushes over to stand before the rail, where he raises the same foot, now long-since healed. He stares at the man, and the man stares back, recognizing the animal that he’d saved so long ago. He scrambles over the railing and rushes into the enclosure, hugging the elephant’s foreleg and murmuring the Kenyan phrase for long-lost-brother. The elephant backs off, wraps its trunk around one of the man's own legs and smashes him into the railing, killing him instantly.

Must have been a different elephant.