NATURAL HISTORY 



745 



Indian elephant is the only species which is 

 now caught and domesticated; and, as it will 

 scarcely ever breed in captivity, the demand for 



ipplied entirely by the capture of adult 

 wild individuals, which are taken chiefly by the 



nee of those which have been already 

 tamed. The Indian elephant is distinguished 

 by its concave forehead and its small ears; the 



African elephant, on the other hand, has a 

 strongly convex forehead, and great flapping 

 ears. The African elephant is chiefly hunt 



tropical forests the tree-ferns rival the palms, 

 rising sometimes to a height of fifty or sixty 

 feet. Ferns are very abundant as fossil plants. 

 rliest known" forms occur in Devonian 

 rocks. Various systems of classification for 

 ferns have been proposed. At pre-ent the order 

 is usually divided into six or eight sub-orders 



or tribes distinguished by differences in the 

 ium. The generic char- 

 acters are founded on the position and direction 

 of the sori and on the venation. The In 

 for the sake of it- ivory, and there is top much | division is that of the Polypodiacese. to which 



>n to believe that the pursuit will ultimately belong the polypody, the lady-fern, the bracken. 



in the complete extinction of these fine j the hard-fern, the spleenwort, the maiden-hair, 

 animals. The elephants are all vegetable j the hart's-tongue fern, etc. A few of the fern* 



era, living almost entirely on the foliage of are used medicinally, mostly as demulcents and 

 shrubs and trees, which they strip off by means astringents. Some yield food, 

 of the prehensile trunk. As the tusks prevent Fishes. The lowest class of back-boned 

 the animal from drinking in the ordinary man- ! animals, or that division of the animal kingdom 



t he water is sucked up by the trunkl which which is known to zoologists as Ytrtrhrata. 



M>n inserted in the mouth, into which it j They are wholly adapted for an aquatic mode 

 empties its contents. Many species of fossil ele- I of life. The shape of the body is such as to 

 phants are known, the most familiar of which is give rise to the least possible friction in swim- 

 the Mammoth. j ming, and thus to admit of rapid locomotion 



Falcon. A name of various birds of prey, in water. To this end also, as well as for pur- 

 members of the family Falconidse. The falcons poses of defense, the body is usually covered 

 proper, for strength, symmetry, and powers of with a coating of scales. The limbs, when 

 Might, are the most perfectly developed of the present, are always in the form of fins, but one 

 feathered race. They are distinguished by hav- or both pairs may be wanting; the anterior or 

 ing the beak curved from the base, hooked at fore limbs are known as the pectoral fins, and 

 the point, the upper mandible with a notch or the posterior or hind limbs as the ventral fin-. 

 tootn on its cutting edge on either side, wings , Besides the fins which represent the limbs, 

 long and powerful, the second feather rather the fishes possess other fins placed in the middle 

 longest, legs short and strong. The largest line of the body; one or two of these run along 

 European falcons are the jerfalcon or gyrfalcon ; the back, and are known as the dorsal fins, one 

 proper, a native of the Scandinavian Peninsula, or two lie on the belly, near the vent, known as 

 and the Iceland falcon; to which may be also the anal fins, and a broad fin at the extremitv 

 added the Greenland falcon. Between these of the spinal column is called the caudal or tail 

 three species much confusion at one time pre- fin. The tail fin is always set vertically in 

 vailed, out they are now distinctly defined and fishes, so as to work from side to side, and is 

 de-cribed. In the Greenland falcon the pre- i the chief organ of progression; it differs alto- 

 vailing color at all ages is white, in the Iceland j gether from the horizontal expansion which 

 falcon, dark. The latter more nearly resembles constitutes the tail of whales, dolphins, dugongs, 

 the true gyrfalcon of Norway, which, however, and manatees animals which belong to tin- 

 is generally darker, rather smaller, but with a i class of mammals. In the form of the tail. 



r tail. The average length of any of these i fishes exhibit two very distinct types of struc- 

 falcons is about two feet. The Greenland ture, termed respectively the homoccrcal and t he 

 species used to be the most highly prized by / t< rocercal type of tail. The homocercal tail 

 falconers. Its food oofttifttl chiefly of ptaf- is the one which most commonly occurs in 



ns, hares, and water-fowl. It is found existing fishes and it is characterized by the 



a wide range of northern territory. The ! fact that the two lobes of the tail are equal. 



dcon is not so large as the jerfalcon, 

 but more elegant in shape. It chiefly inhab- 

 its wild di-triefs. and nestles among rocks. 

 It preys on grouse, partridges, ptarmiiran-. 

 pigeons, rabbits, etc. Its flight is excredini: 

 :t, said to be as much as 150 miles an 

 hour. 



I Vrnv. A natural order of cryptogamous 

 or flnwerli--- plant-, forming the highest group 

 oi the acrogens or summit -growers. They are 



t he leaves, or more properly 

 anting from a rhizome or root-stock, or from a 

 hollow arborescent trunk, and being circmate in 

 vernation, a term d- uner in 



which the frond- an- rolled Up before they are 

 developed in -pring. having then the appear- 

 ance of a bishop's crosier. Ferns have a wide 

 I'hieal range, but are most abundant in 

 humid, temperate, and tropical regions. In the 



and the spinal column stops short at its base; 

 in the heterocereal tail, on the other hand, 

 found in many fossil specimens of the fish class, 

 the spinal column is prolonged into the UPJMT 

 lobe of the tail, so that the tail becon 

 equally lobed. All the tins are supported by 

 bony spines, or rays, which are of two kinds, 

 termed re-pen ivply spinous rays and soft rays. 

 Further, to aid in supporting themselves at 

 varying depths in the water, most fishes are 

 I \\ith a sac containing gas. situated 

 above the alimentary tube, and known a-* the 

 air or swim bladder, by the filling or emptying 

 of which tl.. iid.-n-d heaxier or lighter 



in compari-on with the surrounding water. The 

 skeleton of most fishes consists cntitvlv of bone. 

 but in some it is partly of bone and partly of 

 M.| in a few it remains permanently 

 cartilaginous. 



