98 MAMMALIA. [Chap. III. 



cooper hammering a cask;" and Major Skinner is of 

 opinion that it must be produced by the elephant strik- 

 ing his sides rapidly and forcibly with his trunk. Mr. 

 Cripps informs me that he has more than once seen an 

 elephant, when surprised or alarmed, produce this sound 

 by striking the ground forcibly with the flat side of 

 the trunk ; and this movement was instantly succeeded 

 by raising it again, and pointing it in the direction 

 whence the alarm proceeded, as if to ascertain by the 

 sense of smell the nature of the threatened danger. 

 As this strange sound is generally mingled with the bel- 

 lowing and ordinary trumpeting of the herd, it is in all 

 probability a device resorted to, not alone for warning 

 their companions of some approaching peril, but also 

 for the additional purpose of terrifying unseen in- 

 truders. 1 



Elephants are subject to deafness ; and the Singhalese 

 regard as the most formidable of all wild animals, a 

 " rogue " 2 afflicted with this infirmity. 



Extravagant estimates are recorded of the height of 

 the elephant. In an age when popular fallacies in re- 

 lation to him were as yet uncorrected in Europe by the 

 actual inspection of the living animal, he was supposed 

 to grow to the height of twelve or fifteen feet. Even 

 within the last century in popular works on natural his- 

 tory, the elephant, when full grown, was said to measure 

 from seventeen to twenty feet from the ground to the 

 shoulder. 3 At a still later period, so imperfectly had 



1 Paixegoix, in his Description a celui du cor." — Tom. i. p. 151. 



du Royaume Thai ou Siam, adverts 2 For an explanation of the term 



to a sound produced by the ele- "rogue " as applied to an elephant, 



phant when weary: "quand il est see p. 115. 



fatigue, il frappe la terre avec sa 3 Natural History of Animals. 



trompe, et en tire un son semblable By Sir John Hill, M.D. London, 



