242 THE HIGHLANDS OF CENTEAL INDIA 



choice in my particular department. It is difllcidt to 

 buy h-orses at a fair ; but tbe difficulty is ten times greater 

 in the case of elephants. Every one connected with the 

 keeping of elephants (and camels) is by nature and training 

 from his youth upwards a consummate rascal; and the 

 animal himself is subject to numerous and often obscure 

 vices and unsoundnesses. I have given in an appendix 

 some hints regarding these, as well as on the management 

 of elephants, which woidd scarcely interest the general 

 reader. Elephants difier as widely in their " points " as 

 do horses ; and it is very difficult for an uneducated eye to 

 distinguish these, particidarly in the fattened-up condition 

 the animals generally carry at the fair. Furthermore, and 

 fortimately enough for us, a native's idea of good points in 

 an elephant (as in a horse) differs in toto from ours. He 

 looks not at all to shape, or good action, or likehhood of 

 standing hard work; but first of all to the presence or 

 absence of certain accidental marks — such as the number 

 of toe-nails on the foot, which may be five or six but not 

 four ; the tail, which must be perfect and with a full tuft ; 

 and the colour of the palate, which must be red without 

 spot of black. Some of the best elephants I have known 

 failed in each and all of these points. Then a female or 

 tuskless male is of small value to a native, who wants big 

 white tusks. A rough high action, and a trunk and fore- 

 head of very light colour, are greatly in request by the 

 native buyer, who looks entirely to show, and covers up 

 every part of the animal except the face with an enormous 

 parti-coloured cloth. We, on the other hand, dishke the 

 high rough action, and never by any chance purchase a 

 tusker, who is nearly certain to be ill-tempered. We look 

 for a small well-bred-looking head and trunk, and a clear 

 confident eye devoid of piggish expression, fast easy paces, 

 straight back and croup, wide loins, and generally well- 

 developed bone and muscle — a great test of which is the 

 girth of the forearm, which should measure about three 

 feet eight inches in an elephant nine feet high. A very 

 tall elephant is seldom a good working one, and generally 

 has slow rough paces; so that in a male nine feet, or a 

 female eight feet four inches at the shoulder, should not be 



