Chap. III.] THE ELEPHANT. 
113 
of their own." 1 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. 2 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. 
Makcelltjs Bees, Seigneur de 
Moergestal, who resided eleven 
years in Ceylon in the time of the 
Dutch, says in one of his commu- 
nications, that in herds of forty or 
fifty, enclosed in a single corral, 
there were frequently very young 
calves ; and that "on ne pouvoit 
pas reconnaitre qiielles etoient les 
meres de chacun de ces petits ele- 
phans, car tous ces jeunes animaux 
paroissent faire manse commune ; 
lis tetent indistinctement eeUes des 
femelles de toute la troupe qui ont 
du lait, soit qu'elles aient elles- 
memes un petit en propre, soit 
qu'elles n'en aientpoint." — Buffon, 
Suppl. a r Hist, des Anim., vol. vi. 
p. 25. 
2 "White, in his Natural History 
of Selbome, philosophising on the 
fact which had fallen under his own 
notice of this indiscriminate suck- 
ling of the young of one animal 
by the parent of another, is dis- 
posed to ascribe it to a selfish feel- 
ing ; the pleasure and relief of 
having its distended teats drawn 
"by this intervention. He notices 
the circumstance of a leveret having 
been thus nursed by a cat, whose 
kittens had been recently drowned : 
and observes, that "this strange 
affection was probably occasioned 
by that desiderium, those tender 
maternal feelings, which the loss of 
her kittens had awakened in her 
breast ; and by the complacency 
and ease she derived to herself 
from procuring her teats to be 
drawn, which were too much dis- 
tended with milk ; till from habit 
she became as much delighted with 
this foundling as if it had been 
her real offspring. This incident 
is no bad solution of that strange 
circumstance which grave historians, 
as well as the poets, assert of ex- 
posed children being sometimes 
nurtured by female wild beasts 
that probably had lost their young. 
For it is not one whit more mar" 
vellous that Bomulus and Kemus 
in their infant state should be 
nursed by a she wolf than that a 
poor little suckling leveret should 
be fostered and cherished by a 
bloody Grimalkin." — White's Sel- 
bome, lett. xx. 
