6 THE BOOK OF THE ANIMAL KINGDOM 



war it has proved of inestimable service, and in districts where 

 transport has been associated with almost impossible obstacles, this 

 huge lord of the wild kingdom has been trained to come to the 

 rescue. It is not a quickly-moving animal, but being endowed with 

 tremendous staying powers, is a magnificent plodder, shuffling 

 along for miles at a stretch without any apparent effort. 



During the Roman era these beasts were chiefly used for sport, 

 and we are told that the great Pompey on one occasion had as many 

 as five hundred Lions and eighteen Elephants engaged in the arena 

 at one time ! 



In those far-off days Elephants were found in plenty in Northern 

 Africa, and so common were they that we learn the native tribes 

 bordering upon Ethiopia used their tusks for doorposts and for 

 palisades to enclose their corn-fields ! Alas ! how have the mighty 

 fallen. 



Beyond being serviceable as a beast of burden and for its valuable 

 ivory tusks, there are other parts of the body that are utilized in 

 various ways, for the tongue is said to be very good eating, the 

 foot is converted into soup, the bones make good manure, the teeth 

 are sawn into plates from which such articles as card-racks, knife- 

 handles and paper-presses are manufactured, and celluloid owes part 

 of its composition to ivory-dust. 



Although reports are sometimes circulated as to vast Elephant 

 herds that are still come across in the wild fastnesses, Mr. Selous 

 and other experienced explorers relate that a company of four 

 hundred is a very large one. He himself shot seventy-eight 

 Elephants during his hunting trip in the years 1873-1875, but even 

 although he formed one of a party of four who shot twenty-one 

 Elephants in a day, and once three of the same men killed nineteen 

 out of a herd of twenty-one, Mr. Protheroe states that, "huge bags 

 as these were, they could not compare with the feat accomplished by 

 three Boers. Coming up with a troop of a hundred and four 

 Elephants, they caused the animals to stampede into a marsh, where 

 their heavy bodies became helplessly bogged. During the day 

 every animal was slain, a piece of wanton destruction in which 

 neither females nor calves were spared." 



Small herds of from twenty to fifty individuals are the usual rule, 

 and these huge beasts, in spite of their size, are evidently believers 

 in the motto that "union is strength." They rarely attack unless a 

 single ferocious individual has become ostracized from the rest of 



