THE ELEPHANT OF INDIA. 107 



appearance, yet his activity and speed are very 

 great, a swift horse being sometimes unable to 

 get away from him. The skin is thick and hard, 

 dry like, and wrinkled into folds about the setting 

 on of the legs, on the neck and breast. It is of 

 a brownish gray colour, sometimes slightly mottled 

 with flesh colour, and is thinly set with rigid 

 hairs of a somewhat similar tint, which are most 

 abundant on the head. The form of the head 

 varies with age, it increases immensely in the 

 adults, and exhibits the depth of sinus, which 

 almost entirely surrounds the cavity of the 

 head, and is observed in the skeleton. The 

 teeth are often of immense weight, and with 

 the tusks are the most valuable part of the 

 animal, and for which they were formerly much 

 persecuted. There are sometimes twenty trans- 

 verse ridges in a single tooth. The tusks grow 

 to a very large size, but are of a concentric struc- 

 ture, and afford the finest ivory. The first tusks 

 are shed when they have obtained the length of 

 three or four inches, and are replaced by the 

 permanent ones, which sometimes reach an enor- 

 mous size. They are composed of conical layers, 

 set in one after the other, the interior being the 

 last produced. The base is hollowed into a 

 conical cavity, prolonged into a narrow canal, 

 which runs along the centre of the tusk, and is 

 filled with a blackish matter. The outward layer 



