244 ZOOLOGICAL SKETCHES. 



tives by the reckless fury of their attacks. A comae's 

 office is no sinecure : he has to stick to his seat while 

 his hutti squirts and careers around like an exploding 

 locomotive or encounters his adversary with the force of 

 a catapult. Fighting elephants guard their trunks by 

 doubling them up like a clinched fist, while using their 

 heads like battering-rams, or they stand shoulder to 

 shoulder, after the manner of fighting boars, and, after a 

 prelude of sidelong pushes, suddenly hew away at each 

 other with their tusks. There is not much danger of a 

 general breakdown, for the legs of a full-grown elephant 

 will sustain him in a collision that would ditch a four- 

 horse team ; but there are greater perils: the wild ele- 

 phant may get the upper grip and pull the rider from his 

 seat, or the trained hutti may "get mad." No elephant 

 can be entirely trusted : the tamest of them are subject 

 to tantrums, often most malapropos. During the pro- 

 gress of the duel the hutti seems to forget or ignore his 

 rider; but if he has received a fatal wound the cornacs 

 have to jump off and run for their lives, experience 

 having shown that wounded elephants generally expire 

 in a paroxysm of rage. The feeling of approaching 

 death seems to inspire them with a sudden fury against 

 the authors of their misfortune. A similar outbreak of 

 savagery in articulo mortis has been observed in other 

 animals : chacma baboons and tame panthers in their 

 last hour often drop the mask of allegiance, like Lucius 

 Vanini, "determined to die free." 



