Caar. ITI.] THE ELEPHANT. 113 
of their own.”! Their affection in this particular is 
undoubted, but I question whether it exceeds that of 
other animals; and the trait thus adduced of their 
indiscriminate kindness to all the young of the herd, 
— of which I have myself been an eye-witness, — so far 
from being an evidence of the strength of parental 
attachment individually, is, perhaps, somewhat incon- 
sistent with the existence of such a passion to any 
extraordinary degree.? In fact, some individuals, who 
have had extensive facilities for observation, doubt 
whether the fondness of the female elephants for their 
offspring is so great as that of many other animals; as 
1 A correspondent of Buffon, M. the circumstance of a leveret: having 
Marcettus Brus, Seigneur de been thus nursed by a cat, whose 
Moergestal, who resided eleven kittens had been recently drowned: 
years in Ceylon in the time of the and observes, that “this strange 
Dutch, says in one of his commu- affection was probably occasioned 
nications, that in herds of forty or by that desiderium, those tender 
fifty, enclosed in a single corral, maternal feelings, which the loss of 
there were frequently very young her kittens had awakened in her 
calves; and that “on ne pouvoit breast; and by the complacency 
pas reconnaitre quelles étoient les and ease she derived to herself 
méres de chacun de ces petits élé- from procuring her teats to be 
phans, car tous ces jeunes animaux drawn, which were too much dis- 
paroissent faire manse commune; tended with milk; till from habit 
ils tétent indistinctement celles des she became as much delighted with 
femelles de toute la troupe qui ont this foundling as if it had been 
du lait, soit qu’elles aient elles- her real offspring. This incident 
mémes un petit en propre, soit is no bad solution of that strange 
qu elles n’enaientpoint.”—Burron, circumstance which gravehistorians, 
Suppl. 40 Hist. des Anim., vol. vi. as well as the poets, assert of ex- 
p. 25. posed children being sometimes 
2 Waits, in his Natural History nurtured by female wild beasts 
of Selborne, philosophising on the that probably had lost their young. 
fact which had fallen under hisown For it is not one whit more mar- 
notice of this indiscriminate suck- vellous that Romulus and Remus 
ling of the young of one animal in their infant state should be 
by the parent of another, is dis- nursed by a she wolf than that a 
posed to ascribe it to a selfish feel- poor little suckling leveret should 
ing; the pleasure and relief of be fostered and cherished by a 
haying its distended teats drawn bloody Grimalkin.”—Wuure’s Sel- 
by this intervention. He notices borne, lett, xx. 
I 
