1 8 6 Elepha n tta net. 



hundreds of other elephants, not to mention human 

 lives. 



It was far more humane to learn how to kill an 

 elephant instantaneously with a single shot, than to 

 allow the animals to be caught in pitfalls and trans- 

 fixed by a stake, or to be slowly tortured to death 

 by countless spear wounds. 



Also, with the flesh of the elephants he fed whole 

 tribes of starving natives, and so he brought the 

 ivory into the market with the least possible pain to 

 the animals, and the greatest possible good to the 

 various native tribes, which depend largely on the 

 elephant for their subsistence. 



Both species have a similar gait. When they walk 

 they do not, like the horse, move the feet alternately 

 and diagonally, but walk alternately with the feet of 

 each side. 



Moreover, instead of bending the leg at the so- 

 called "knee " and " hock," as the horse does, and 

 furthermore bending it again at the pasterns, the 

 elephant scarcely bends its legs at all, but swings 

 them forwards and backwards, planting the heel first 

 on the ground, just as man does. In fact, the 

 elephant is, in our modern athletic slang, " a fair heel 

 and toe pedestrian." 



A glance at the skeleton will show the reason for 

 this gait. In the elephant, the " cannon bones," or 

 "shank bones," i.e., the middle mctacarpal bone of the 

 fore foot and the middle metatarsal bone of the hind 

 foot are not lengthened as in the horse, and the 

 entire foot is brought close to the ground, all five 

 toes resting on it. 



This peculiar structure of the legs enables the 

 elephant to use them as offensive weapons. It does 

 not kick with its hind legs like the horse, nor strike, 

 boxer fashion, with its fore-feet, like the stag, but it 



