THE ELEPHANT 257 



exceed nine feet in height at the shoulder, with a length of 

 twenty-six feet from the tip of the trunk to the extremity of 

 the tail ; but in the Calcutta Museum is the skeleton of an 

 animal that was quite twelve feet in height. Jumbo, once a 

 favourite at the Zoo, was eleven and a half feet high and 

 weighed six and a half tons. He was of the African species, 

 and as he was reared in captivity it is not unreasonable to 

 suppose that wild animals may exceed even those enormous 

 dimensions. 



It is a doubtful point to what age Elephants attain ; but in 

 captivity they have been known to exceed the century, and 

 in their forest homes, with the advantage of strictly natural 

 food, they might easily live half as long again. It is said 

 that the remains of a dead Elephant are rarely met with, 

 even in its most favourite haunts. It is suggested that the 

 animal retires to some secret spot upon its approaching 

 demise ; but no ivory-hunter has even been known to 

 stumble unawares into an Elephant cemetery and a fortune 

 at the same time. 



The two species differ considerably in the matter of tusks. 

 In the African Elephant both sexes are tusked, the only 

 difference being that the tusks of the male are larger than 

 those of the female, whereas in the Asiatic species the tusks 

 of the females never more than barely protrude beyond the 

 jaws, and not even all the males possess tusks worth mention- 

 ing. Tusks vary from one to nine or even ten feet 

 in length, with a girth of twenty-four inches at the base, 

 and weigh anything up to 235 Ibs. A tusk of these dimen- 

 sions is the exception and not the rule. Animal for animal, 

 African tusks are not only larger, but the ivory is of better 

 quality. 



There is practically no difference in the natural habits of 

 the Elephant, whether in Asia or Africa. It is mainly a 

 forest-dweller, living on a diet of roots, twigs, leaves, young 

 shoots, fruits, grass, and other herbage. It prefers to feed 

 from trees, from the branches of which it strips the leaves 

 with its trunk ; in eating grasses it twists its trunk round a 

 tussock ; fruits are picked separately. In a forest the animal 

 will work extraordinary damage. Trees that possess no tap- 

 roots are levered up with the tusks by the roots in order to 



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