118 MAMMALIA. 



not eyen show the number of the toes (five on each foot), which 

 remain encrusted and hidden under the skin. 



This shapeless, colossal, and heavy body is covered with a skin, 

 callous, full of cracks and crevices, very thick, of a dirty blackish 

 grey colour, having a few hairs sprinkled over here and there, 

 and which are almost invisible, except on the back, on the eye- 

 lids, and on the tail, which is terminated by a tuft.* 



Elephants live in the hottest parts of Africa and of Asia. Revel- 

 ling in forests and swamps, they keep together in troops more 

 or less numerous, which are either led by an old male, or very 

 commonly by an old female. Their food consists of herbs, roots, 

 and grains. They often seek their food in cultivated fields, where 

 tliey do considerable damage. 



Tame Elephants are very fond of bananas and cocoa-nuts ; but 

 their usual diet consists of haj^, straw, rice, raw or cooked, bread, 

 and the leaves of trees. It is remarkable that they are easily 

 accustomed to drink wine, brandy, and all sorts of spirituous liquors. 



To support this enormous mass, these animals reqiiire to swallow 

 a great quantity of food. In India, generally about fifty kilo- 

 grammes of rice a day are given to one ; to this is added, to keep 

 the animal in good health, a certain quantity of grass or fresh 

 leaves, and especially sugar-cane tops when obtainable. 



The Elephant which was brought to Versailles in the time of 

 Louis XIV. used to eat eighty pounds of bread a day and two 

 bucketsful of soup ; it drank twelve pints of wine, and consumed 

 besides a great quantity of cakes which the visitors brought to it. 



The pace at which Elephants walk is much more rapid than the 

 clumsiaess of their appearance woidd lead one to suppose. These 

 animals can, according to certain authors, do their twenty or 

 twenty-five leagues a day. They also swim well. 



It M'as for a long time asserted that Elephants could not lie 

 down, and that thej^ always slept standing. It is true that among 

 Elephants, as among Horses, are found some that can sleep stand- 

 ing, and only rarely lie down ; but generally they sleep lying on 

 their side, like the majority of other quadrupeds. 



The Elephant mother carries her young one twenty months. 



* The fossil Mammoth Elephant was well provided with both wool and long 

 hristly hair, as protection from the cold climates in which it chiefly lived. At this 

 present time, an Indian Elephant, which has now lived for many years in the 

 elevated region of Tibet, has hecome well clad with hair. — Ed. 



