GIANTS WITH TUSKS AND TRUNK. 



145 



adapted for the support of the head md trunk, which are 

 his principal organs of action and defense. 



3. Compared with the bulk of his body, the head ap- 

 pears small ; but not so when we take into account the 

 weight and size of its appendages. These are pendulous 

 ears, a couple of gigantic tusks in the male, and the pro- 

 boscis or trunk, which, in large specimens, is capable of 

 reaching to a distance of seven or eight feet. The tusks, 

 which correspond to the canine teeth of other quadrupeds, 

 appear only in the upper jaw, fully developed in the male, 

 and only partially in the female. These he employs as 

 his main weapons of defense, as well as in clearing away 

 obstructions from his path, and in grubbing up succulent 

 roots, of which he is particularly fond. The eye of the 

 elephant is small, but brilliant ; and though, from the po- 

 sition in the head, it is incapable of backward and upward 

 vision, yet this defect is remedied, to a great extent, by 

 the acuteness of his hearing. 



4. The trunk 

 is of a tapering 

 form, and com- 

 posed of several 

 thousand minute 

 muscles, which 

 cross and inter- 

 lace each other, 

 so as to give it 

 the power of 

 stretching and 

 contracting, of 

 turning itself in 



every direction, and of feeling and grasping with a deli- 

 cacy which is altogether astonishing. It incloses the nos- 

 trils, and has the power of inflating itself, of drawing in 

 10 



1. African Elephant. 2. Indian Elephant. 



