140 



ANIMALS OF LAND AND SEA 



birds as hawks and phalaropes. Some mammals, like the bats, 

 show little variation, but most show more than do the birds. 

 In the bears, the elephants, and some other types after the 

 adult stage is reached the size keeps on increasing slowly until 

 death so that the adults are very variable. 



In the turtles, lizards, snakes and crocodiles, as in all, or 

 nearly all, the fishes, the size keeps on increasing long after 

 the adult stage is reached, and giant individuals occur in all 

 those forms in which size and increasing sluggishness do not 

 invite destruction by interfering with the capture of the prey 

 or by diminishing the power of defense. 



Some kinds of insects have a very definite adult size, hke 

 the swallow-tails among the butterflies, while in others the 

 adult size is variable, as in our httle aphid-eating butterfly. 

 Other insects often vary very greatly in their size in different 

 regions, while in very many the size, normally constant, may 

 become much reduced by adverse conditions. 



The African elephant is the largest of land creatures, weigh- 

 ing about 3 tons and reaching a height of 11 feet at the shoul- 

 ders; but it is only one-tenth the size of the largest whales, 

 or perhaps less. The Indian elephant and its relatives, which 

 are really quite different animals, are not so large. By no 

 means all African elephants are 11 feet in height, only the 

 oldest males. The life of an elephant is rather long, for they 

 have lived in captivity for as much as 130 years. 



While the African elephant is the bulkiest of animals, the 

 giraffes are much the tallest; most giraffes are 15 or 16 feet 

 in height, but one sort reaches 18 feet. The body is short, 

 however, only 7 feet in length exclusive of the tail. 



Of the various bears much the largest are the great brown 

 bears of the Alaskan peninsula and Kadiak Island which may 

 run up as high as 1800 pounds in weight. 



Of the cat tribe the largest is the tiger, reaching 11 feet from 

 nose to tip of tail. The Bengal tiger is somewhat less, rarely 

 so much as 10 feet long. 



The tiger, by the way, inhabits a vast extent of territory, 



