140 Method of Calch'ing Wild LLphant's. 



I have fecn young ones- from one day to three years old 

 fucking their dams, hut never faw them ufe their trunks, 

 except to prefs the breaft, which, by natural inftinft, they 

 feemed to know would make the milk flow more readily. 

 The mode of connection between the male and female is 

 now afcertaincd beyond the poffibility of a doubt; as Mr. 

 Buller, Lieut. Hawkins, and many others, faw a male copu- 

 late with a female, after they were fecured in the Keddah, 

 in a manner exactly fimilar to the conjunction of the horfe 

 with a mare. 



This fact entirely overturns what has been fo often related 

 concerning the fuppofed delicacy of this ufeful animal, and 

 a variety of othtr hypothefes, which are equally void of 

 foundation. As far as I know, the exact time an elephant 

 goes with young, has not yet been afcertaincd, but which 

 cannot be Iefs than two years, as one of the elephants 

 brought forth a young one twenty-one months and three 

 davs after flic was taken. She was obferved to be with 

 young in April or May 1788, and flie was only taken in 

 January preceding ; fo that it is very likely (lie mull have 

 had connection v ith the male fome months before (lie was 

 fecured, otherwifc they could not difcover that the was with 

 young, as a foetus of lcfs than fix months cannot well be 

 fuppofed to make any alteration in the fize or fliape of fo 

 large an animal. The young one, a male, was produced 

 October 16th, 1789, and appeared in etery refpect: to have 

 arrived at its rail time Mr. Harris, to whom it belongs, 

 examined its mouth a few days after it was brought forth, 

 and found that one of its grinders on each fide had partly 

 cut the gum. It is now alive and well, and begins to chew 

 a little grafs; 



I have further to remark, that one of the tufks of the 

 young elephant has made its appearance ; fo that we can 

 now ascertain it to be of that fpecies called Mucknah, the 

 Mlks of which are always final], and point nearly ftraight 



Jownwai'ds, 



