THE AUTOPSY OF AX ELEPHANT. 225 



indented by the fore-foot. This peculiar gate gives a 

 swinging or swaying motion to the body as each step 

 is taken, making it quite difficult for a person to keep 

 his seat while riding on the animal's back. 



The skeleton of the elephant presents some in- 

 teresting peculiarities, one of which is the giant air- 

 cells of the cranium, the sinuses extending into the 

 diploic spaces, pressing the tables of the skull twelve 

 inches apart in some places. No other animal exhib- 

 its such a chambered cranium. The nasal passages, 

 high on the forehead, quite resemble the "blow- 

 holes " of the whale. 



So far as cervical vertebrae are concerned the ele- 

 phant adheres to the mammalian type by having seven 

 individual pieces. The spinous process of the seventh 

 rises high, conforming in this respect to the spines of 

 the first dorsal bones. To these spines is attached the 

 huge ligamentum nuchse that sustains the head 

 weighed down with tusks. The elephant has twenty- 

 three dorsal or trunk vertebrae, and nineteen or 

 twenty of these sustain ribs. The shoulder-blades 

 exhibit a branch process from the spinous ridge on the 

 dors urn of the scapula. It extends backward two or 

 three inches at a right angle from the regular spinous 

 process. The glenoid cavity is shallow, and twice as 

 long as broad. It looks downward, therefore the 

 scapula rises vertically above the humerus. The top 

 of the blade reaches higher than the tip of the spine 

 of the seventh cervical vertebra. The humerus bears 

 the ordinary characteristic of the typical bone. The 

 great tuberosity rises higher than the articular face of 

 the bone. The deltoid ridge extends below the mid- 

 dle of the humerus, and the bicipital groove is deep. 

 The radius and ulna cross each other obliquely on 



