62 Memoir upon living and fossil Elephants, 



Article V. 

 Comparison letween the Grinders of the Indian and the 



African Elephant, and first distinrtiue Character of these 



two Species. Examination of various fossil Elephant 



Teeth. 



For a long period teeth belonging to the elephants of 

 India and those of Africa have been indiscriminately de- 

 scribed, without comparing them, and without perceiving 

 that they did not resemble each other in every particular. 

 Thus the Royal Society of London, in 1715, caused to be 

 represented, in order to serve as an object of comparison, 

 some grinders from Africa, which considerably resemble, as 

 we well know, those from India; and no person insisted 

 upon any difference which might have escaped the eye. 



The accurate and judicious Daubenton was equally far 

 from remarking the difference, and Buffon and Linnaeus 

 never supposed there was any more than one species of ele- 

 phants. We do not even perceive any traces of this discri- 

 mination in Gmelin's edition of the Systema Natures', and, 

 in fact, all that is found in the antient authors and in tra- 

 vellers is vague, and can only be referred to simple varieties. 



Such, for instance, are the assertions of the antients re- 

 specting the different degrees of the aptitude of these ani- 

 mals for war. 



Diodorus Siculus, lib. ii. asserts that " the elephants of 

 India far surpass in courage and strength those of Libya." 



Appian confirms this, {De Bellis Syriac. ed. Amsterdam. 

 1670, Svo. vol. i. p. 173.) According to him, " Domi- 

 tius, who commanded the Romans against Antiochus, judg- 

 ing the elephants he got froiir Africa would be of no use to 

 him, because they were smaller and because they were afraid 

 of the large elephants, he ranged them behind the others-,'* 

 (?*. e. behind the Indian elephants). 



Phiiy and Solinus remark generally that the African ele- 

 phants were smaller than the Indian, and were afraid of 

 them. It is extremely probable, however, that the elephants 

 in the service of Hannibal and Jugurtha were of the former 

 species only. 



There 



