[Illustration: A TIGER’S ATTACK.
_By permission Illustrated London News._ _Frontispiece._]
_MARVELS OF ANIMAL LIFE SERIES._
THE IVORY KING
A POPULAR HISTORY OF
THE ELEPHANT AND ITS ALLIES
BY
CHARLES FREDERICK HOLDER
FELLOW OF THE NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, ETC.; AUTHOR OF “ELEMENTS
OF ZOOLOGY,” “MARVELS OF ANIMAL LIFE,” ETC.
_ILLUSTRATED_
NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS
1902
COPYRIGHT, 1886, 1888, BY
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS.
PRESS OF BERWICK & SMITH,
BOSTON, U.S.A.
TO
MY MOTHER
This Volume
IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED.
PREFACE.
The elephant is the true king of beasts, the largest and most powerful
of existing land animals, and to young and old a never ceasing source of
wonder and interest. In former geological ages, it roamed the continental
areas of every zone; was found in nearly every section of North America,
from the shores of the Arctic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, and from New
England to California. Where the hum of great cities is now heard, in
bygone days the trumpeting of the mastodon and elephant, and the cries of
other strange animals, broke the stillness of the vast primeval forest.
But they have all passed away, their extirpation undoubtedly hastened by
the early man, the aboriginal hunter; and the mighty race of elephants,
which now remains so isolated, is to-day represented by only two species,
the African and the Asiatic, forms which are also doomed.
To produce the eight hundred tons of ivory used annually, nearly
seventy-five thousand elephants are destroyed; and it does not require
the gift of prophecy to foresee their extinction in the near future. The
Asiatic elephant is said to be holding its own; but the rapid advance of
the British in the East, the introduction of railroads and improvements
which mark the progress of civilization in India, where heretofore the
elephant has been employed, cannot fail to have a fatal effect, and their
extermination is only a matter of time. Knowing these facts, and the
close relationship which the elephant has ever held in the advancement of
mankind in the East, it stands a picture of absorbing interest, the last
of a powerful race, worthy of earnest efforts for its preservation. The
question of its extinction rests with the rising generation. In America
and England the ornithologists have made an appeal for our feathered
friends, and ladies have been asked to put their veto upon the excessive
use of feathers, which is surely tending to the extermination of our
birds. The elephant can be protected in the same way. Every ivory tusk
that is brought to the African coast from the interior is said to cost a
human life; and that we may have ivory fans, billiard-balls, chessmen,
knife-handles, inlaid furniture, grotesque Japanese statuary, etc.,
the elephant, who has been man’s helpmate from 1200 B.C., and perhaps
earlier, to the present day, is threatened with extermination. The
prominence of the elephant in early times is, I think, not generally
appreciated. There was hardly a great public movement entailing war, in
the early days of the East, in which these animals did not constitute an
all-important element. Defeat and success were, as a rule, determined
by the number of elephants; and the fate of nations may be said to have
depended upon the prowess of the proboscidians.
In the present volume, I have endeavored to present as much of the
history of the elephant as is compatible with popular interest, treating
the animal in all its relations to man, and the economic questions
involved: in war, pageantry, sports and games, as a faithful laborer
and servant, comrade and friend, its ancestral forms, structure and
anatomy. As the work is in no sense a scientific one, the student may
regret the absence of details relating to anatomy, etc. To compensate for
such omission, I have appended a carefully selected bibliography of all
the most important works, papers, and monographs, ancient and recent,
relating to the subject.
I am indebted to Mr. George P. Sanderson, officer in charge of the
elephant-catching establishment at Mysore, Bengal, whose valuable work
embracing his experience with the Asiatic elephant has been frequently
consulted; also to the works of Sir Emerson Tennent, and especially to
the author of “Menageries,” published by Messrs. Charles Knight & Co.,
London.
C. F. H.
NEW YORK, June 1, 1886.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. NATURAL HISTORY OF THE ELEPHANT 1
II. HABITS AND WAYS OF ELEPHANTS 12
III. THE INTELLIGENCE OF THE ELEPHANT 27
IV. THE MAMMOTH 36
V. THREE AND FOUR TUSKED ELEPHANTS (MASTODONS) 49
VI. JUMBO 64
VII. HOW ASIATIC ELEPHANTS ARE CAPTURED ALIVE 77
VIII. ASIATIC ELEPHANTS IN CAPTIVITY 91
IX. HUNTING THE ASIATIC ELEPHANT 97
X. THE WHITE ELEPHANT 117
XI. ELEPHANTS IN CEYLON 137
XII. ROGUE ELEPHANTS 148
XIII. HUNTING THE AFRICAN ELEPHANT 164
XIV. BABY ELEPHANTS 179
XV. TRICK ELEPHANTS 184
XVI. ELEPHANTS AND THEIR FRIENDS 192
XVII. TUSKERS AT WORK 195
XVIII. IVORY 217
XIX. THE ELEPHANT IN THE ARTS 231
XX. ELEPHANTS IN THE AMPHITHEATRE 241
XXI. THE ELEPHANT IN PAGEANTRY 249
XXII. WAR ELEPHANTS OF MODERN ASIA 255
XXIII. WAR ELEPHANTS OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT AND HIS SUCCESSORS 277
XXIV. WAR ELEPHANTS OF THE ROMANS AND CARTHAGINIANS 293
XXV. PROBOSCIDIAN FICTIONS 309
BIBLIOGRAPHY 317
INDEX 325
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
Frontispiece. A TIGER’S ATTACK, Facing Title.
FACING PAGE
PLATE I. ELEPHANT’S SKULL AND TRUNK, 4
” II. ELEPHANTS MOVING TIMBER, 20
” III. THE SIBERIAN MAMMOTH, 30
— A MAMMOTH HUNT, 36
” IV. ST. PETERSBURG MUSEUM, 48
” V. COHOES MASTODON, 58
” VI. THE DINOTHERIUM, 64
” VII. AFRICAN ELEPHANT, JUMBO, 72
” VIII. BABY JUMBO, 80
” IX. ASIATIC ELEPHANT, 88
” X. HUNTING THE ELEPHANT WITH SWORDS, 100
” XI. THE WHITE ELEPHANT, TOUNG TALOUNG, 120
” XII. HERD OF ELEPHANTS, CEYLON, 140
” XIII. AFRICAN ELEPHANT, 166
” XIV. HEBE AND BABY BRIDGEPORT, 180
” XV. ELEPHANT CARRYING LOGS, 200
” XVI. ASIATIC ELEPHANT AND TIGER, 218
” XVII. STATUE OF JUPITER, 238
” XVIII. PREHISTORIC STONE PIPES, 246
” XIX. THE PRINCE OF WALES AT LAHORE, 255
” XX. THE PRINCE OF WALES AT AGRA, 270
” XXI. ANCIENT ELEPHANT MEDALLIONS, 280
” XXII. ” ” ” 290
[Illustration: MEXICAN HIEROGLYPHIC, WITH ELEPHANT FEATURES.
_Chapter V._]
THE IVORY KING.
CHAPTER I.
NATURAL HISTORY OF THE ELEPHANT.
The elephant is the largest living land animal; and, though numerous
forms existed in early geological times, it is represented to-day by
two species only,—the African elephant, _Elephas Africanus_, and the
Asiatic elephant, _Elephas Indicus_. The geographical range of the
former originally included nearly all Africa, but now the animals are
more closely confined to the central interior regions. The Asiatic
elephant is found in the forests of India, Ceylon, Burmah, Siam, Cochin
China, Sumatra, and the Malay peninsula; and, while the introduction
of railroads into these countries in ensuing years will perhaps result
in its extinction, at present its numbers are not growing less. The
African elephant differs from its Asiatic cousin in several particulars.
The apparent distinguishing features are the tusks that attain a much
greater development and occur in both sexes, while in the Asiatic species
the males alone possess them. The African elephant is at least a foot
higher than the Asiatic, attaining a maximum height of eleven feet. Its
ears are extremely large, covering the shoulder, and in some instances
measuring three and a half feet in length by two and a half feet in
width, while those of its Indian relative are comparatively small.
When Jumbo—who was an African elephant—and one of the Asiatic elephants
stood side by side, the difference was very marked. The summit of the
head of the Indian species forms a pyramid, while the front, or forehead,
is concave. In Jumbo the front of the head was somewhat convex, the eye
was larger; and when we compare the feet, we find that while the African
elephant has, as a rule, four nails on each foot, the Asiatic has four
on each hind-foot, and five on each fore-foot. The number of nails often
varies with individuals. The Indian natives esteem those animals most
which possess five on each fore-foot, and four on each hind-foot, or
eighteen, odd numbers being considered unlucky. The author of “Oriental
Field Sports” says that he has observed elephants with fifteen nails,
which no native would purchase; and he heard of one with twenty, and
saw one with eighteen. These differences are external, as all elephants
possess five toes upon each foot internally. The two species also differ
as to their teeth. The incisor teeth of elephants are greatly developed,
forming the tusks, and only occur in the upper jaw of living forms. They
often attain enormous size, weighing from one hundred and fifty to three
hundred pounds. The tusks of the Asiatic elephants born in this country
were visible at birth. Concerning them in general, Sanderson states that
they are not renewed, but are permanent; his information being based upon
the personal observations of many years. Corse, who made observations in
the last century, and published them in the “Philosophical Transactions,”
1799, states that the elephants observed by him had milk, or deciduous
tusks as well as permanent ones; that the milk-tusks appeared at about
six months of age and fell out between the first and second years. He
found in the young skull the place of the capsule of the permanent
tusks, which appear a couple of months after the loss of the milk-tusks.
Huxley says, “In recent elephants, only the two incisors are preceded by
milk-teeth;” and this may be the generally accepted belief. The tusks
have no roots like the teeth of some animals, but fit firmly into what
are called premaxillary sockets: and if we should examine this buried or
hidden portion, we should find that it was partly hollow, so to speak;
the ivory at the root being very thin, and surrounding a pulp where the
ivory is being secreted. The length of this soft pulp varies according to
the age of the animal: thus, in young elephants, only a small portion of
the tusk outside of the gum is solid ivory; all the rest being hollow,
or containing the pulp. As the animal grows, this cavity decreases in
length, until in extremely old elephants it disappears entirely and the
tusk is solid ivory.
In the left tusk of the elephant shot by Sir Victor Brooke (p. 115), the
pulp-cavity was wholly obliterated, its place occupied by an exceedingly
dense nodular dentine. This tusk was diseased. In the right tusk of the
same animal the pulp-hollow extended from the base through half the
imbedded portion, or thirteen and a half inches. In a pair of tusks owned
by Col. Douglas Hamilton, of the British army, the pulp-cavity occupies
ten inches and a half of the imbedded length. From this it is evident
that the length of a tusk cannot be accurately determined from mere
observation, as in a large elephant the sockets are from one foot six
inches to one foot nine inches in length; so that an animal might have a
tusk three feet and a half long, and show only one foot and a half of it,
the gum alone concealing about four inches.
As the ivory is so soft at the base of the tusk, it is evident that it
can be easily broken; and, if a bullet or spear strikes this spot, it
becomes embedded, and eventually incorporated, in the tusk. Workers in
ivory are often surprised to find a leaden bullet in the solid ivory. In
a collection in London, there is a section of a tusk which was cut at a
piano-forte manufactory in 1805, which has a wrought-iron musket-ball
firmly embedded in it; and other instances can be seen in the museum of
the London University.
[Illustration: PLATE I.
FIG. 1.—Molar Tooth of African Elephant.
” 2.—Molar Tooth of Asiatic Elephant.
” 3.—Molar Tooth of Elephas Americanus.
” 4.—Skull of Dinotherium.
” 5.—Molar Tooth of Mastodon giganteus.
FIG. 6.—Head of an Elephant, showing the muscles. _B._ Section of
the trunk.
FIGS. 7, 8, 9.—Show the Uses of the Trunk.
FIG. 10.—Section of the Skull of an Indian Elephant. _s._ air sinuses.
_n._ nostrils. _b._ brain. _m._ molar tooth. _t._ tusk.]
In their growth, tusks often assume strange shapes, being liable to
twist, just as the horns of a cow. Livingstone saw an elephant with
three tusks, the third one growing out between the other two. The tusks
frequently grow straight; some twist in a spiral, others form a complete
circle; and many elephants have only one from birth,—like the fictitious
unicorn. These animals are called _Gunésh_ by the natives. The name is
that of the Hindoo god of wisdom; and, if the single tusk of the _Gunésh_
is the right one, the animal is reverenced. Some dimensions of tusks
will be given in the chapter on Ivory. Perhaps the largest was one sold
in Amsterdam some years ago. It weighed, according to Kolokner, three
hundred and fifty pounds. Eden measured several nine feet in length,
and one described by Hartenfels exceeded fourteen feet. There is one in
the museum of Natural History, Paris, seven feet in length. The uses to
which the large incisors are put, are often exaggerated. The African
elephant employs its tusks to uproot small mimosa-trees, but they are
never used to overthrow as large objects as is often stated. Sir Samuel
Baker measured mimosa-trees four feet six inches in circumference, and
thirty feet high, which elephants had pulled down; and the damage they
cause in a mimosa-forest is almost incredible. These trees, however, have
no tap-root, and are comparatively easy to overthrow. Gumming says, “I
have repeatedly ridden through forests where the trees thus broken down
lay so thick across one another that it was almost impossible to ride
through the district.” The female elephant uses her tusks to scrape the
barks from trees; but the large tusks of the males are designed as a
defence,—the elephant with the finest tusks ruling the herd,—and terrific
wounds are made by them. The elephant Conqueror, in this country, was
killed by being gored in this way; and in India, when it is necessary
at the government corral to subdue a mad elephant, a reliable tusker is
provided with steel tusks, or glavies, which fit over the stumps of the
others, and with these they do terrible work.
If we examine the skull of the elephant, we find only two molar teeth on
each side of each jaw,—eight in all; and no more, as a rule, are seen at
one time, twenty-four in all appearing during the lifetime of an elephant.
The teeth appear in a curious way, moving gradually forward from
behind in regular succession; each old front tooth as it is worn away
being pushed out of place by its successor. This wonderful provision
is necessary, as the front teeth are worn away by the sand and gritty
substances taken in with the food. The molar, or grinding, teeth are
extremely heavy and large, and are nearly buried in the socket, the
upper portion only showing. They are made up of a number of transverse
perpendicular plates composed of a mass of dentine incased in an outside
layer of enamel, which is in turn covered by a layer of cement that fills
the spaces between the plates, and seems to bind the whole together.
Each of the enamel plates, though appearing separate at the surface, is
connected with the others at the base. The difference between the teeth
of the Indian and African species is shown in Plate I. In the Indian
elephant the ridges of enamel are narrower, more undulating, and appear
in greater numbers than in the African species, in which the ridges are
less parallel, and enclose lozenge-shaped spaces. There are certain
other differences in the species, such as the number of bones in the
vertebral column, or “backbone;” those of the African elephant numbering
from twenty to twenty-one, and those of the Indian elephant nineteen to
twenty. In examining the skull of an elephant, we are struck with its
enormous size, and the comparatively small space taken up by the brain.
The skull is not so heavy as it appears, the interior being divided off
into partitions, or air-cells; so that, while there is a large surface
for the attachment of the trunk-muscles, the head is massive, but not
heavy. The neck of the elephant is so short, that, without some special
provision, it could not feed from the ground; and this is seen in the
trunk, or proboscis, that is a prolongation of the upper lip and nose,
sometimes seven feet in length. It commences at the nasal opening of the
face, contains a pair of tubes closed by a valvular arrangement, and at
its end on the upper side is a small prolongation like a finger, opposite
which is a prominence, or tubercle, that acts as a thumb. The trunk is
made up of a vast number of muscles, estimated by Cuvier at about forty
thousand. Upon the outside, the trunk appears to be ringed; and it is a
most remarkable organ, combining the offices of a hand and nose, and
exercising taste, touch, suction, expulsion, and prehension. With it the
elephant lifts its driver, pulls over small trees, reaches for its food,
takes in water which is in turn expelled into the mouth, squirts water or
sand over its body; in fact, there is hardly any thing, from drawing a
cork from a bottle, to hurling a tiger into the air, that this wonderful
trunk cannot do for its owner. Without it the elephant would starve. One
in India which had lost its trunk, had to be fed by having food placed
in its mouth. Though the trunk is so useful, it is a very tender and
delicate organ, and is not used in the rough manner generally supposed.
In making an attack, it is raised high in air out of the way. When a
great weight is lifted, it is not the trunk, but the tusks, which are
employed, the former only holding the object upon the latter.
Once, when visiting the herd of elephants owned by Mr. Barnum, the
trainer called my attention to a small hole, or opening of a gland,
situated on each side of the head between the eye and the ear, that is
scarcely perceptible. It is the opening of a duct, perhaps two inches
in length, that extends toward the lachrymal organs, and leads to a
secretory gland. From this orifice, there exudes at times a thick, gummy
substance, which sometimes clogs up the opening, and undoubtedly affects
the animal unpleasantly; as, when this is filled, the trainer told me
that the elephant would take a small stick or straw in its trunk, and
endeavor to remove the obstruction. This will be alluded to in the
chapter on Rogue Elephants. This exudation is generally considered a
warning in the East, that the elephant is going to be ugly, and is called
_must_. In Asiatic wild elephants it occurs usually in cold weather, from
November to February. This peculiarity has been noticed from the earliest
times: it was remarked upon by Strabo, and is referred to in Hindoo
mythology. “The Hindoo poets frequently allude to the fragrant juice
which oozes, at certain seasons, from small ducts in the temples of the
male elephant, and is useful in relieving him from the redundant moisture
with which he is then oppressed; and they even describe the bees as
allured by the scent, and mistaking it for that of the sweetest flowers.
When Crishna visited Sanc’ha-dwip, and had destroyed the demon who
infested that delightful country, he passed along the bank of a river,
and was charmed with a delicious odor which its waters diffused in their
course. He was eager to view the source of so fragrant a stream, but was
informed by the natives that it flowed from the temples of an elephant,
immensely large, milk-white, and beautifully formed; that he governed a
numerous race of elephants, and the odoriferous fluid which exuded from
his temples had formed the river.”
It is evident that wild elephants probe this opening, which is a little
larger than a pin-head, and that the sticks used often break off in
the orifice, and by working in give the animals such agony that they
go mad for the time. When Mr. Cowper Rose shot an elephant in Africa,
the men immediately began to hunt for the “piece of wood in the head,
to which they attached great value as a charm.” Mr. Rose was evidently
not familiar with the gland, or opening. He says, “I sat on one (a dead
elephant) while they searched for the wood in his head. It lies about
an inch beneath the skin, embedded in fat, just above the eye, and has
the appearance of a thorn, or a small piece of twig broken off. Some
are without it: and, on examining the spot minutely, we found that there
was a small opening in the skin,—a large pore, it may be; and I conceive
that this phenomenon is simply accounted for by the twig breaking in
this hole when the animal is in the act of rubbing his head against
the bushes.”
The body of the elephant, weighing sometimes three tons, is supported
by four ponderous, pillar-like legs, the movements of which, especially
the posterior, or hinder pair attract immediate attention; and the first
impression is, that the hind-legs of the elephant are entirely different
from those of any other mammal. They seem to bend in the wrong direction.
The difference consists merely in the greater length of the thigh-bone,
or femur, which brings the knee much farther down than in other animals.
The horse is equally remarkable for an opposite reason; as it walks and
stands upon the toe-nail of its single toe, while its heel is as high
up as the knee of the elephant is low. Covering this wonderful frame,
or skeleton, is the loose, wrinkled skin an inch thick, so tough and
heavy,—often weighing eight hundred pounds,—that the elephant and others
were at one time included in a group called the thick-skinned animals
(pachyderms). The skin is comparatively hairless; though some elephants
have more than others, and young ones more than adults. The theory
generally accepted, is that the elephants of southern countries have
lost their hair by long-continued residence in regions where it was not
necessary. Quite recently two young or dwarfed Asiatic elephants were
exhibited in New York as mammoths, on account of their superabundance of
hair; but it is needless to say that they were ordinary Asiatic elephants.
* * * * *
In the present work, it is not necessary to refer particularly to the
internal organization of the elephant, but the subject is replete with
interest. The enormous heart, a foot in diameter, in its contraction
exerts tons of pressure; and the blood forced out by it must attain
almost the force of water from the hose of a fire-engine. Hunters have
often been astonished at seeing elephants, which they have been chasing
for some time, insert their trunks into their mouths, and there obtain
a supply of water that is blown over the dry and heated body. The
explanation of this is, that the stomach of the elephant resembles that
of the camel, in having a chamber that can be cut off or separated from
the digestive cavity, in which about ten gallons of water is stored as a
reserve supply, or to be used as occasion requires.
The female elephant is generally smaller than the male. The mammary
glands are situated between the fore-legs, and the calf nurses with its
mouth, instead of the trunk as was once supposed. The period of gestation
is about five hundred and ninety-seven days. The weight of the elephant
at birth differs in individuals. One observed by Owen weighed one hundred
and seventy-five pounds, and stood two feet ten inches in height. The
little elephant Bridgeport weighed two hundred and forty-five pounds at
birth, and stood three feet in height. The baby elephant America, born
in Philadelphia, weighed two hundred and thirteen and a half pounds,
and measured thirty-four inches and a half at the shoulder. It grew so
rapidly, that in eleven months it gained about seven hundred pounds,—not
so very surprising, as it came of a very heavy family. Its mother weighed
seven thousand and twenty pounds, and was only twenty-three years old;
and the father, who was three years older, four tons. The baby’s trunk,
or proboscis, was at first twelve inches long, and nine inches in
circumference at the root, or base.
The young Asiatic elephant grows about eleven inches in the first year,
eight in the second, six inches in the third, five in the fourth, five in
the fifth, in the sixth three and a half, and in the seventh, two and a
half, the measurements having been made by Mr. Corse.