Chap. IL] THE ELEPHANT. 85 
the gravity of the elephant, and incompatible with his 
love of solitude and ease. Or may it be assumed as an 
evidence of the sagacity of the elephant, that the only 
two animals to which it manifests an antipathy, are the 
two which it has seen only in the company of its enemy, 
man ? One instance has certainly been attested to me 
by an eye-witness, in which the trunk of an elephant 
was seized in the teeth of a Scotch terrier, and such was 
the alarm of the huge creature that it came at once to 
its knees. The dog repeated the attack, and on every 
renewal of it the elephant retreated in terror, holding 
its trunk above its head, and kicking at the terrier 
with its fore feet. It would have turned to flight, 
but for the interference of its keeper. 
Major Skinner, formerly commissioner of roads in 
Ceylon, whose official duties in constructing highways 
involved the necessity of his being in the jungle for 
months together, always found that, by night or by day, 
the barking of a dog which accompanied him, was suffi- 
cient to put a herd to flight. On the whole, therefore, 
I am of opinion that the elephant lives on terms of 
amity with every quadruped in the forest, that it neither 
regards them as its foes, nor provokes their hostility by 
its acts ; and that, with the exception of man, its greatest 
enemy is a fly / 
The current statements as to the supposed animosity 
of the elephant to minor animals originated with iElian 
and Pliny, who had probably an opportunity of seeing, 
what may at any time be observed, that when a captive 
elephant is picketed beside a post, the domestic animals, 
goats, sheep, and cattle, will annoy and irritate him by 
their audacity in making free with his provender ; but 
this is an evidence in itself of the little instinctive dread 
G 3 
