I©4f 
ELEPHANT* 
the power of music. Suetonius relates that the em- 
peror Domitian had a troop of elephants disci- 
plined to dance to the sound of music ; and that 
one of them, who had been beaten for not having 
his lesson perfect, was observed the night after- 
wards in a meadow, practising it by himself. 
At Paris some curious experiments have been 
lately made on the power of music over the sensibi- 
lity of the elephant. A band of music went to 
play in a gallery extending round the upper part 
of the stalls in which were kept two elephants, 
distinguished by the names of Margaret and Hans. 
A perfect silence was procured. Some provisions, 
of which they were fond, were given them to en- 
gage their attention, and the musicians began to 
play. The music no sooner struck their ears, 
than they ceased from eating, and turned in sur- 
prise to observe whence the sounds proceeded. 
At sight of the gallery, the orchestra, and the 
assembled spectators, they discovered considerable 
alarm, as though they imagined there was some 
design against their safety. But the music soon 
overpowered their fears, and all other emotions 
became completely absorbed in their attention to 
it. Music of a bold and wild expression excited 
in them turbulent agitations, expressive either of 
violent joy, or of rising fury. A soft air per- 
formed on the bassoon, evidently soothed them 
to gentle and tender emotions. A gay and lively 
air moved them, especially the female, to demon- 
strations of highly sportive sensibility. Other va- 
riations of the music produced corresponding 
changes in the emotions of the elephants. 
The natives pf Africa greedily eat the flesh of 
the elephant. The Hottentots and Boshiesmen, 
in the neighbourhood of the Cape of Good Hope, 
esteem it a very agreeable article of food ; but the 
||utch colonists regard the eater of elephant’s 
