38 SCRIPTURE NATURAL HISTORY. 



also to wipe its eyes, and to protect them against the dust and 

 flies, that might otherwise incommode them. It appears delighted 

 with music, and very readily learns to beat time, to move in meas- 

 ure, and even to join its voice to the sound of the drum and the 

 trumpet. 



Its sense of smelling is not only exquisite, but in a great 

 measure pleased with the same odors that delight mankind. The 

 elephant gathers flowers with great pleasure and attention ; it picks 

 them up one by one, unites them into a nosegay, and seems charm- 

 ed with the perfume. The orange-flower seems to be particularly 

 grateful both to its sense of taste and smelling ; it strips the tree of 

 all its verdure, and eats every part of it, even to the branches them- 

 selves. It seeks in the meadows the most odoriferous plants to 

 feed upon ; and in the woods it prefers the cocoa, the banana, the 

 palm, and the sago-tree, to all others. As the shoots of these are ten- 

 der and filled with pith, it eats not only the leaves and the fruits, but 

 even the branches, the trunk, and the whole plant, to the very roots. 



But it is in the sense of touching that this animal excels all 

 others of the brute creation, and, perhaps, even man himself. The 

 organ of this sense lies wholly in the trunk, which is an instrument 

 peculiar to this animal, and which serves for it all the purposes of 

 a hand. The trunk is, properly speaking, only the snout lengthen- 

 ed out to a great extent, hollow like a pipe, and ending in two 

 openings, or nostrils, like those of a hog* An elephant of fourteen 

 feet high has the trunk about eight feet long, and five feet and a 

 half in circumference at the mouth, where it is thickest. It is 

 hollow all along, but with a partition running from one end of it to 

 the other; so that though outwardly it appears like a single pipe, it 

 is inwardly divided into two. This fleshly tube is composed of 

 nerves and muscles, covered with a proper skin of a blackish color, 

 like that of the rest of the body. It is capable of being moved in 

 every direction, of being lengthened and shortened) of being bent 

 or straightened, so pliant as to embrace any body it is applied to, 

 and yet so strong that nothing can be torn from its gripe. 



To aid the force of this grasp, there are several little eminences like 

 a caterpillar's feet, on the underside of this instrument, which, with- 

 out doubt, contribute to the sensibility of the touch, as well as to 

 the firmness of the hold. Through this trunk the animal breathes, 

 drinks, and smells, as through a tube ; and at the very point of it, 

 just above the nostrils, there is an extension of the skin, about five 

 inches long, in the form of a finger, and which in fact answers all 

 the purposes of one : for, with the rest of the extremity of the trunk, 

 it is capable of assuming different forms at will, and, consequently, 

 of being adapted to the minutest objects. ]By means of this, the 

 elephant can take a pin from the ground, untie the knots of a rope, 

 unlock a door, and even write with a pen. 'I have myself seen,' 

 says uElian, an elephant writing Latin characters on a board, in a 

 very orderly manner, his keeper only showing him the figure of 

 each letter. While thus employed, the eyes might be observed 

 Studiously cast down upon the writing, and exhibiting an appear- 



