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CHAPTER I 



ELEPHANTS IN GENERAL. 



THE ORDER PROBOSCIDEA — DERIVATION OF NAME — THE FAMILY ELEPHANTID^E— FOSSIL ELEPHANTS 

 — THE MAMMOTH — THE MASTODON — THE ELEPHANT — ITS TRUNK — ITS TUSKS — THE ELEPHANT 

 IN HISTORY— IN THE EAST — IN ROME — IN MODERN TIMES — THE TWO SPECIES. 



THE order Proboscidea contains the largest of terrestrial ani- 

 mals. The name is derived from the Greek word proboscis, "a 

 trunk," and expresses the most conspicuous feature of the 

 animals contained in it. It comprises only one family, the Elephantid^E, 

 or Elephants, those strange creatures which excite awe by their strength, 

 and astonishment by their sagacity, and which form a clearly marked link 

 between the creatures of the world we live in, and those which roamed 

 over the surface of the globe in ages long before it assumed its present 

 conditions of climate. A few words on the fossil remains of the extinct 

 varieties of the elephant will form a fit prelude to our sketch of the sur- 

 vivors. 



THE MAMMOTH. 



The MAMMOTH, Elephas primigenius, has left its bones in abundance 

 on the Arctic coasts of the continent of Asia and on the islands of New 

 Siberia. In the latter, indeed, the soil seems formed of bones and tusks 

 cemented together into a solid mass by sand and ice. When the thaws 

 of summer loosen the sandy tundras near the rivers Obi, Yenisei, and 

 Lena, heaps of huge tusks are revealed. Often the teeth are still fixed in 

 the jaws, and huge ribs and thigh-bones have been found still covered 

 with hide, and hair, and flesh, and still bloody. An old traveler, Ides, 

 who in 1692 went through Siberia to China, writes in his account of his 

 journey : " The natives call the beast that has left these remains the 

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