Chap. XVII. Mammals — Law of Battle. 50 1 



All male animals which are furnished with special weapons 

 for fighting, are well known to engage in fierce battles. The 

 courage and the desperate conflicts of stags have often been 

 described ; their skeletons have been found in various parts of 

 the world, with the horns inextricably locked together, shewing 

 how miserably the victor and vanquished had perished. 3 No 

 animal in the world is so dangerous as an elephant in must. 

 Lord Tankerville has given me a graphic description of the 

 battles between the wild bulls in Chillingham Park, the descen- 

 dants, degenerated in size but not in courage, of the gigantic 

 Bos primigenius. In 1861 several contended for mastery; and it 

 was observed that two of the younger bulls attacked in concert 

 the old leader of the herd, overthrew and disabled him, so that 

 he was believed by the keepers to be lying mortally wounded in 

 a neighbouring wood. But a few days afterwards one of the 

 young bulls approached the wood alone; and then the "monarch 

 " of the chase," who had been lashing himself up for vengeance, 

 came out and, in a short time, killed his antagonist. He then 

 quietly joined the herd, and long hel d undisputed sway. Admiral 

 Sir J. B. Sulivan informs me that, when he lived in the Falk- 

 land Islands, he imported a young English stallion, which 

 frequented the hills near Port William with eight mares. On 

 these hills there were two wild stallions, each with a small troop 

 of mares; "and it is certain that these stallions would never 

 " have approached each other without fighting. Both had tried 

 " singly to fight the English horse and drive away his mares, 

 " but had failed. One day th< j y came in together and attacked 

 " him. This was seen by the capitan who had charge of the 

 " horses, and who, on riding to the spot, found one of the two 

 " stallions engaged with the English horse, whilst the other was 

 " driving away the mares, and had already separated four from 

 * the rest. The capitan settled the matter by driving the whole 

 " party into the corral, for the wild stallions would not leave 

 " the mares." 



Male animals which are provided with efficient cutting or 

 tearing teeth for the ordinary purposes of life, such as the 

 carnivora, insectivora, and rodents, are seldom furnished with 

 weapons especially adapted for fighting with their rivals. The 

 case is very different with the males of many other animals. 

 We see this in the horns of stags and of certain kinds of 



3 See Scrope (' Art of Deer-stalk- wapiti, moose, and rein-deer have 



*mg,' p. 17) on the locking of the been found thus locked together. 



horns with the Cervus elaphus. Sir A. Smith found at the Cape ol 



Richardson, in ' Fauna Bor. Ameri- Good Hope the skeletons of two 



cana,' 1829, p. 252, says that the guus in the same condition. 



