522 



UNGULATES. 



they are stated to make a great noise at night. A female captured by Mr. H. H. 

 Johnston gave birth to three young. Mr. H. C. V. Hunter states that many of 

 them are captured alive by the natives for the sake of their skins, of which several 

 are sewn together to make cloaks. 



It is somewhat remarkable that at present no extinct animals have been 

 discovered which appear allied to the hy races. 



Elephants. 



Suborder Proboscidea. 



Family ELEPHANTIDJE. 



From their peculiar bodily conformation, their huge size, which exceeds that 

 of all other terrestrial mammals, and the high degree of intelligence which they 

 have been supposed to display, elephants have always excited an amount of 

 popular interest far surpassing that accorded to most other animals. And in truth 

 this deep and widespread interest is by no means misplaced, since elephants 

 really are among the most extraordinary and remarkable forms with which the 

 zoologist is acquainted. Through long experience we are now thoroughly familiar- 

 ised with their appearance, but if we were to see one for the first time we 

 should probably regard it as the strangest mammal that ever existed; and, 

 indeed, we should not be far wrong in doing so. It has already been mentioned 

 that, so far as regards the structure of their feet, elephants are some of the most 

 generalised of all living mammals ; and a similar remark will apply with equal 

 truth to the structure of the rest of their limbs. When, however, we take into 

 consideration the peculiar nature of their dentition, and their marvellously con- 

 structed proboscis, we find them possessing characters of the highest specialisation ; 

 and it is this combination of generalised and specialised features which render 

 elephants so peculiarly interesting to the zoologist. 



At the present day these animals are represented only by the Indian and 



African species, but in past epochs there were a number of extinct forms, some of 



which serve to connect the living ones, to a certain limited extent, with other 



Ungulates ; and since it is only by a thorough comprehension of the characters 



presented by the dentition of these extinct elephants that the structure of the teeth 



of their living representatives can be understood, it will be necessary in our account 



of the group to devote almost as much attention to the fossil as to the existing 



species. It is worthy, however, of note that although some of the extinct elephants 



do, as already stated, depart less widely from ordinary Ungulates than is the case 



with the living Indian and African species, yet such approximation to the normal 



type is only one of degree, and we are at present totally unacquainted with any 



animals which are absolutely intermediate between elephants and other Ungulates. 



The origin of the group is, therefore, still totally known, although their nearest 



relations may prove to be certain extinct groups noticed in the sequel. 



The most striking external peculiarity of elephants, and the one 

 Characters. . & ..... ., 



from which their title of proboscidians is derived, is the long, flexible 



