The Elephant. 115 



of India, lie took a large Elephant which had fought very 

 valiantly for the king, and naming him Ajax, dedicated 

 him to the sun, and then let him loose with this inscrip- 

 tion : " Alexander, the son of Jupiter, hath dedicated 

 Ajax to the sun." This Elephant was found with this 

 inscription 350 years after. 



The greatest wonder the Elephant presents to the 

 admiration of the intelligent observer of nature is his 

 proboscis, or trunk, which attains a length of six or eight 

 feet, and is so flexible that he uses it almost as dexterously 

 as a man does his hand. It was erroneously said, that 

 the Elephant could receive nourishment through his 

 trunk; this sort of pipe is nothing but a prolongation of 

 the snout, for the purpose of breathing, into which the 

 animal can by the strength of his lungs draw up a great 

 quantity of water or other liquid, which he spouts out 

 again, or brings back to his mouth by inverting and 

 shortening his proboscis for this purpose. 



Captain Marry at, in his very entertaining work called 

 Masterman Beady, relates a curious instance of the saga- 

 city of an Elephant in India, which had fallen into a 

 deep tank. The tank was so deep that it was impossible 

 to hoist the Elephant up, but when the people threw 

 down several bundles of faggots, the sagacious animal 

 laid one bundle above another, always standing on each 

 tier as he arranged it, till at last he raised the pile high 

 enough to allow him to walk out of the tank. But 

 instances of the sagacity of this noble creature might be 

 cited ad infinitum. In the East, where they are made 

 available in the service of man, they will load a boat 

 with singular dexterity, carefully keeping every article 

 dry, and disposing and balancing the cargo with the 

 utmost precision. 



Its strength is proportionate to its bulk : it will carry 

 three or four thousand pounds weight on its back, and 

 upwards of a thousand pounds on its tusks. 



The African Elephant is a distinct species (JE. africanus) 

 readily distinguished from his Asiatic brother, by the 

 enormous size of his flapping ears. He is abundant in 

 the southern part of Africa and is killed annually in 

 great numbers for the sake of his tusks. 



