ELEPHANTS. 229 



in transporting artillery and heavy baggage ; and their 

 docility and obedient performance of their duties, even 

 when left to themselves, is perfect. They are not now 

 used in war except by some of the native princes ; but 

 they largely enter into the state processions, decked out 

 with the most costly trappings of gold and silver, 

 frontlets of jewels, gold and silver chains, and bells, etc. 

 Travellers generally place a kind of canopy on their 

 backs, in which two or three persons can sit ; but the 

 saddle is most used when hunting tigers. They dex- 

 terously catch these animals upon their tusks if the 

 attack be made in front. But the tiger will sometimes 

 seize them in the flank ; when, if they cannot roll upon 

 him, the elephants rush forward, and the tiger is gene- 

 rally shot. The assertion that the elephant and rhino- 

 ceros will fight a duel for the pleasure of the thing 

 does not seem to be borne out by experience, but combats 

 have been seen between them in which sometimes one 

 and sometimes the other have gained the victory. 



The quantity of food daily consumed by an elephant 

 in captivity is calculated at 200 lb., besides thirty-six 

 pails of water. It consists of turnips, rice, chaff, bran, 

 hay, and sea-biscuit. Straw is allowed for his bed, 

 which is generally consumed before morning ; besides 

 which, when they are in menageries, they receive no 

 small quantity of dainties from visitors. I never could 

 enter the rotunda in the Paris menagerie without being 

 furnished with bread or carrots for its inhabitants. 

 The instant the Indian elephant caught sight of me he 

 used to sit down, get up again, make what was called a 

 curtsey, and play other antics ; and the instant I came 

 before him, squat down again, his trunk raised, and his 

 enormous mouth wide open to receive what I threw 



