pomp, of luxury, and of ostentation, than of utility. As a means of
warlike offence they have been, since the introduction of firearms,
absolutely disused; and it is only as beasts of burden that they are
turned to any useful account. In this respect the services of a single
Elephant are equal to those of five or six horses, as they will carry
from fifteen to twenty hundred weight, and travel from forty to fifty
miles a day. They generally consume a hundred weight and a half or two
hundred weight of solid food, and thirty or forty gallons of fluid,
in the course of the day. They are fond of wine, spirits, and other
intoxicating articles, by the attraction of which they are frequently
induced to exert their powers, and to perform various feats of dexterity,
when all other methods have failed to render them tractable. They become
strongly attached to their keepers; but, if irritated by ill usage, their
hatred is as violent as their affection, and is carefully stored up until
a favourable opportunity occurs, when they seldom fail to remember an
insult or an injury, even at very distant periods of time.
With regard to their sagacity much has been written, and many exaggerated
and many incredible stories have been told; but it would appear that
those who have attributed to the Elephant a degree of intelligence
superior to every other beast, have been misled by outward appearances,
and by the natural prepossession arising from his gigantic and imposing
figure. Without his trunk, upon the singular and admirable structure of
which most of that skill and dexterity which have been regarded as the
result of mental reflection is entirely dependent, he would be, in all
probability, as very a brute as the rhinoceros, the hippopotamus, or the
hog. By means of that organ, however, he unquestionably acquires the
capacity of performing feats of which other animals are incapable; but
here his superiority ends. In intelligence, as in docility, he is far
inferior to the dog; and many other quadrupeds might fairly compete with
him in both. Thus to turn a key in a lock, to push back a bolt, to untie
a rope, to uncork a bottle, to search in the pockets of his keepers for
apples or oranges, these and many other tricks of a similar kind, for
which he is famous, are evidently nothing more than mechanical actions,
to the performance of which he is stimulated, like other beasts, at first
by the promise of reward or the fear of chastisement, and afterwards
by the mere force of habit. In like manner the dexterity with which he
learns to load and unload himself, or to place a man or child upon his
back by means of his trunk, without offering them the slightest injury;
and on the other hand the precision with which he is made to execute the
will of the Asiatic despot on the unhappy victims of his displeasure, by
seizing them and casting them beneath his feet, to be there dispatched,
according to the tenor of the orders which he receives, either with a
single crush, or with all the horrors of a lingering death; these also
are actions of no higher order than many other animals are equally
capable of in a moral point of view, although not so well fitted for them
by physical conformation.
In conclusion we have only to add that the fine little Elephant from
which our figure was taken appears from his dimensions and from the very
small size of his tusks to be little more than three years old. He is
extremely good tempered, and became reconciled to his situation almost
from the very moment of his arrival.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE ZEBRA OF THE PLAINS.
_EQUUS BURCHELLII._
The well known group of which the Horse, the Ass, and the Zebra
constitute the leading species, is distinguished from all other
quadrupeds by the form of their hoof, which is single and undivided,
rounded in front, of considerable thickness, and enveloping the extremity
of their only apparent toe. They have in each jaw six powerful cutting
teeth, accompanied on either side by the same number of grinders with
square crowns flattened at the top: the males have two canines in the
upper jaw, and frequently in the lower also; and this structure is
sometimes shared by the females of the domesticated races. Between
the canines and the molars there is a vacant space, which, our
readers scarcely need to be reminded, receives the bit, the small but
irresistible instrument by means of which man has for ages exercised
the most complete control over the services of these useful animals.
Although purely and essentially herbivorous, their anatomy, as well as
their habits, separates them most thoroughly from the Ruminants, and
approximates them in several respects to the Pachydermatous order, with
which, in spite of their many discrepancies, both physical and moral, M.
Cuvier has associated them. It is needless to point out the incongruity
of this union, and it would be equally so to say more of the general form
and external characteristics of a group, the principal species of which
are so constantly before our eyes.
It may, however, be observed, that it has been proposed to divide it
into two distinct genera, the one containing the Horse alone, and
characterized by the flowing tail uniformly covered with long hair, by
the absence of a line of darker coloured hairs along the back, and by
the presence of callous protuberances on the hind legs as well as on the
fore: the other comprehending the Asses and Zebras, and distinguished
by the tail having a brush of long hairs at its extremity only, by the
presence of the dorsal line, and the absence of the protuberances on the
posterior legs. Such a division, resting as it does on striking but not
very essential differences, may fairly be admitted for the purpose of
separating the genus into sections; but can hardly be regarded as founded
on characters of sufficient importance to disunite so well marked and
strongly connected, as well as so limited, a group. In the same paper
in which this new arrangement was proposed, the beautiful animal which
we have now to describe was first specifically distinguished by Mr. Gray
from the Common Zebra, with which it had previously been confounded,
and characterized by him under the name of the Asinus Burchellii. Still
there exists so much confusion between the two Zebras, many naturalists
falling into the same error with Mr. Burchell, who first remarked the
distinction between them, and regarding the present animal as the Zebra
of zoologists, and the common one in reality as the new species; while
others have absolutely counterchanged a part of the characters of each,
and thus made confusion worse confounded; that we cannot do better than
describe with some little detail the markings of the individual now
before us.
The ground colour of its whole body is white, interrupted by a regular
series of broad black stripes extending from the back across the sides,
with narrower and fainter ones intervening between each. Over the
haunches and shoulders these stripes form a kind of bifurcation, between
the divisions of which there are a few transverse lines of the same
colour; but these suddenly and abruptly cease, and are not continued
on the legs, which are perfectly white. Along the back there is a
narrow longitudinal line, bordered on each side with white. The mane
is throughout broadly and deeply tipped with black, and is marked by a
continuation of the transverse bands of the neck. The lines of the face
are narrow and beautifully regular; from the centre of the forehead they
radiate downwards over the eyes; along the front of the muzzle they are
longitudinal, the outer ones having a curve outwards; and on the sides
they form broader transverse bands. From the confluence of these bands
on the extremity of the muzzle, the nose, and the lower lip, those parts
become of a nearly uniform blackish brown. The tail is white: there is no
longitudinal ventral line: and a large black patch occupies the posterior
part of the ear near the tip. The hoofs are moderately large, deep in
front, shallow behind, and much expanded at their margin.
Of the habits of these animals in a state of nature we know but little.
They inhabit the flat parts near the Cape of Good Hope, the common Zebra
being confined to the mountains. All the attempts that have been made to
domesticate either the one or the other, and to render them serviceable,
have hitherto failed; but there seems no good reason why they should not,
with proper management, be brought as completely under subjection as the
other species of the genus. The subject of the present article, which has
now been about two years in the Menagerie, will suffer a boy to ride her
about the yard, and is frequently allowed to run loose through the Tower,
with a man by her side, whom she does not attempt to quit except to run
to the Canteen, where she is occasionally indulged with a draught of ale,
of which she is particularly fond.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE LLAMA.
_LLAMA PERUVIANA._ CUV.
In common with the Camels, the Llamas are distinguished from all other
Ruminating animals chiefly by the absence of horns, by the structure of
their feet, and by their mode of dentition, in all of which these two
closely allied groups very nearly correspond with each other. In their
general form there is also some similarity; but the latter are much
lighter in their proportions, and far more lively and spirited in their
motions. They exhibit no traces of the clumsy and unsightly humps which
disfigure the backs of the former, and their necks and limbs, of greater
comparative length, appear to be far less oppressed by the superincumbent
weight of the head and body, which are consequently maintained in a more
upright and graceful position. The principal difference in their internal
structure consists in the want of that extensive appendage to the first
stomach, which renders the Camel so peculiarly valuable in situations
where water is with difficulty procured, by enabling him to lay in at
once a sufficient stock of that indispensable necessary to supply his
wants for many days. But even without this appendage the Llamas are
observed to be by no means so much exposed to frequent thirst as the
generality of animals, and to drink but rarely and in moderate quantity.
The feet of the Camels and of the Llamas are very different in form
from those of all the other Ruminants. They are, it is true, deeply
divided, like those of the latter, into two apparent toes; but cannot be
said, like them, to part the hoof, for they have no real hoof, and the
extremities of their protruded toes are armed only with short, thick,
and crooked claws. These toes are in the Camels united posteriorly by
a horny process, which is wanting in the Llamas. The teeth of both are
nearly similar: they consist of six incisors in the lower jaw and two in
the upper; of two canines in each; and of six molars in the upper, and
five in the lower, on each side. None of the other Ruminants exhibit the
least appearance of cutting teeth in the upper jaw. The nostrils of both
consist externally of mere fissures in the skin, which may be opened
and closed at pleasure, and which are surrounded by a naked muzzle; and
their upper lip is divided into two distinct portions, which are very
extensible, and capable of much separate motion.
The species of the group, of which the Llama forms the type, have
been involved by the imperfect descriptions of naturalists in almost
inextricable confusion. No less than five have been admitted; but the
variations of colour and of size, and the degree of length and fineness
of the wool, differences rather commercial than natural, afford almost
the only positive distinctions that have yet been laid down between them;
and when we consider that some of them have been for ages in a state of
domestication, it will readily be allowed that such characters as these
are, to say the least, trivial and uncertain. Our animals, which are
nearly four feet in height at the shoulder, and somewhat more than five
feet to the top of the head, have the neck, the back, the sides, and
the tail, which is rather short, covered with a beautiful coat of long,
bright brown, woolly hair. The long and pointed ears, and the small and
attenuated head, on which the hair is short, close, and even, are of
a grayish mouse-colour; the outside of the legs is of the same colour
with the sides of the body; and their inside, as also the under part
of the body and the throat, pure white. The hair on the limbs is short
and smooth. In these respects they offer but little to distinguish them
from any of the animals which have been exhibited in this country under
the various names of Llamas, Pacos, and Guanacos. There is, however, at
present in the Garden of the Zoological Society, an animal, which besides
being of larger size, covered with longer and coarser wool, and entirely
white (which latter circumstance may be purely accidental), differs
remarkably in the form of the forehead, which in it is perfectly flat,
while in our animals it rises in a strong curve. This character, it is
probable, affords a permanent ground of distinction, although we venture
not at present to speak decidedly respecting it.
The Llamas congregate together in considerable herds on the sides of
the Andes, and generally in the colder and more elevated regions. When
the Spaniards first arrived in Peru they were the only beasts of burden
employed by the natives; and even at the present day, when horses have
become so excessively common, they are usually preferred for passing the
mountains, on which their sureness of footing, exceeding even that of
the mule, gives them a manifest superiority. Generally speaking they are
quiet, docile and timid; but they occasionally exhibit much spitefulness,
especially if teased or ill treated. Their mode of evincing this is very
peculiar, and consists in darting their saliva through their nostrils
with considerable force. Like all the other Ruminants they subsist
entirely on vegetables. Those in the Tower Menagerie have a particular
fondness for carrots; and if one of these is abstracted from them while
they are eating, their anger is immediately roused, and they spit, as
it is termed, with the greatest vehemence, covering with their saliva a
surface of three or four yards in extent. One of the animals in the cut
is represented in the act.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE MALAYAN RUSA-DEER.
_CERVUS EQUINUS._ CUV.
The Deer constitute a numerous and beautiful group of Ruminants, which
are readily distinguished by the graceful symmetry of their form, by
their long and slender, but firm and sinewy, legs, by their broad and
pointed ears, and by the comparative shortness of their tails; but more
especially by the generally large and branching horns which ornament the
heads of the males. Like all the ruminating animals, with the exception
of those mentioned in the preceding article, they are furnished with
eight cutting-teeth in the lower jaw, opposed to a callous and toothless
surface in the upper; and with expanded, flat, and deeply bifurcated
hoofs, constituting two distinct and apparent toes, above which they
have also the rudiments of two others. Some of the species have canine
teeth in the upper jaw, generally in the males alone; and they have all
six molars on each side. In the greater number of them the nostrils are
surrounded by a naked muzzle; and most of them are also provided with a
sinus or sac, of greater or less extent, immediately beneath the inner
angle of the eye, called the sub-orbital sinus, the _larmier_ of the
French zoologists.
The horns, which form the most distinguishing character of the genus, are
perfectly solid throughout their whole extent. Their form varies very
considerably in the different races; but they are constantly uniform in
the same species, unless accidentally or artificially perverted from
their natural growth. In some they are simple at the base and terminate
in a broad and palmate expansion, which is variously lobed and divided;
in others they are more or less branched, giving off antlers in different
directions; and in some few they are short and nearly simple. They
fall off and are renewed annually in all the species which inhabit the
northern and temperate regions of the earth, and in those in which they
attain any considerable size; but Sir T. Stamford Raffles was of opinion,
and his opinion has been in some measure confirmed by the observations of
Major C. Hamilton Smith, that several of the tropical species with small
and nearly simple horns are exempted from this general law. The horns are
smaller and less developed in the young than in the full grown and adult
animal, and diminish again in size, and frequently become irregular, as
he advances in age. In one species alone, the Rein-Deer of the North, the
female wears the same palmy honours with the male; but they do not in
her reach the same enormous extent.
The high degree of domestication to which this latter species has been
brought, and the invaluable services which it renders to the Laplander,
added to the tranquil content which most of the deer manifest in a
state of captivity, afford sufficient proofs that there is nothing
in the constitution of the group repugnant to their being tamed and
familiarized with man; but from none of the other races have any real or
essential advantages been as yet derived. The quiet confidence, mixed
with a certain air of cautious timidity, which they exhibit in their
half-restricted state, in the park or the chase, where they are kept
more for ornament than use, is perfectly indicative of their general
character. But the very mildness of their disposition has been turned to
their disadvantage, and one of the gentlest of animals, because endowed
by nature with a high degree of fleetness, with some sagacity, and with
a certain share of timidity, has been marked out by man as the chosen
victim of his cruelty, disguised under the captivating name of sport.
The Samboo Deer, as the present species is called by his keepers, belongs
to the Rusa group, which are distinguished from the rest of the genus by
their horns being provided with a single antler at the base, and with a
lateral snag which forms a kind of bifurcation towards the extremity.
They are usually of large stature and nearly uniform colours, and are,
for the most part, furnished with a rough and shaggy mane, a broad and
expanded muzzle, and sub-orbital openings of considerable size. The
handsome Stag now before us is dark cinereous brown above, nearly black
on the throat and breast, and light fawn, intermixed with dirty white,
on the inside of the limbs. His eyes are surrounded by a fawn-coloured
disc, and patches of the same colour occupy the fore knees, and a space
above each of the hoofs in front. His nose, which is black, is enveloped
in an extensive muzzle; his ears are nearly naked on the inside, and
marked by a patch of dirty white at the base externally; and his mane,
which spreads downwards over the neck and throat, is remarkably thick and
heavy. His tail is black above, and light fawn beneath; and a disc of the
latter colour occupies the posterior part of the buttocks, having on each
side a blackish line which separates it from the lighter tinge of the
inside of the thighs. His horns, when properly grown, consist of a broad
burr, from which the pointed basal antler rises almost perpendicularly
to the extent of nine or ten inches; of a stem, which is first directed
outwards, and then forms a bold curve inwards; and of a snag, or second
antler of smaller size, arising from the stem near its extremity on the
posterior and internal side, and forming with it a terminal fork, the
branch however being shorter than the stem, and not exceeding five or six
inches in length. The entire length of the horns is about two feet; they
are of a dark colour, very strong, and deeply furrowed throughout.
The foregoing description of the horns, it should be observed, is taken
from those of the year before last, which were of the genuine or normal
form. Those of the last year, which are represented in the cut prefixed,
were from some cause or other remarkably different, that of the right
side especially exhibiting a singular monstrosity in the production of
additional branches of irregular form. Whether this was the effect
of disease or of advancing age, or whether it arose solely from some
temporary and accidental cause, will probably be determined by the growth
of the present year, which is not yet sufficiently advanced to enable us
to ascertain its probable form.
With regard to the sub-orbital sinus, which in this and all the
neighbouring species is of very considerable size, its uses are evidently
connected with the function of respiration, and probably also with the
sense of smell. It is denoted externally by a longitudinal fissure,
placed beneath the inner angle of each of the eyes, and leading into a
sac or cavity, which in some cases communicates internally with the nose;
and its inner surface is lined by a membrane abundantly supplied with
follicles for the secretion of mucus, which is sometimes produced in very
large quantities. This latter circumstance has induced some naturalists
to regard these openings as mere cuticular appendages. That they really,
in some species at least, communicate with the nostrils, is proved by the
observations of Mr. White of Selbourne, who states that in consequence
of this communication the Fallow-Deer are enabled to take long-continued
draughts with their noses deeply immersed in the water, the air in the
mean time passing through the sub-orbital slits. So singular a statement
was naturally enough doubted and called in question; but it has never,
so far as we know, been impugned on ocular testimony; while it has
received the fullest confirmation from other observations made upon the
very species now under consideration, in which the air passing from the
sub-orbital sinus, while the animal drinks, may be felt by the hand, and
even affects the flame of a candle. Another proof of the connexion of
these cavities with the nose is derived from the fact that the animals
which are provided with them frequently apply their orifices, equally
with those of the nostrils, to the food which they are about to take,
opening and shutting them with great rapidity.
The subject of the present article, which, like all the rest of the minor
group of which he forms a part, is a native of India and of the Indian
Islands, was a present to his Majesty, who kept him for some time, in
company with another of the same species, at large in the great park
at Windsor. As both, however, happened to be males, they disagreed so
violently, and their quarrels at length rose to such a pitch, that in
order to preserve peace it was found absolutely necessary to separate
them; and our animal, as the most outrageous of the two, was dismissed
the royal service, and condemned to the captivity of the Tower. Since
this period he has become exceedingly tame, the cause of his former ill
temper being removed, and demeans himself as quietly as the most harmless
and gentlest of his tribe.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE INDIAN ANTELOPE.
_ANTILOPE CERVICAPRA._ PALL.
In the elegant symmetry of their form and the light and graceful agility
of their motions, the Antelopes are superior even to the Deer, whom,
however, they closely resemble, not merely in outward shape, but also
in internal structure. Like them, in addition to the coincidence of a
slightly made and beautifully proportioned figure, they are frequently
furnished with a naked muzzle, and with the same remarkable sinus beneath
the inner angle of the eye; and their ears are generally of considerable
size, erect, and pointed. But they are strikingly distinguished from them
and from all the other animals of the order by the peculiar character
of their horns, which are formed of an elastic sheath enclosing a
solid nucleus, and are for the most part common to the females as well
as to the males. They have no canine teeth, and exhibit no appearance
of a beard such as is seen in the Goats. The horns vary greatly in the
different races; they are sometimes straight and upright, at other times
slightly curved, and frequently spirally twisted with the most beautiful
regularity: they are usually surrounded by elevated rings or by a spiral
ridge, are constantly of the same form in the same species, and are not
subject to an annual falling off and renewal, as in the Deer, from which
they differ also in their mode of growth, the horns of the latter group
lengthening at their apices, while those of the former receive their
increase at the base.