Chap. II.] 



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 



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