NATURALISTS’ CALENDAR.
Mean Temperature 40·15.
THE ELEPHANT,
THE ELEPHANT,
As he laid dead at Exeter Change.
In the position he liked best
He seem’d to drop, to sudden rest;
Nor bow’d his neck, but still a sense
Retain’d of his magnificence;
For, as he fell, he raised his head
And held it, as in life, when dead.
VISIT TO MR. CROSS, PROPRIETOR OF THE ELEPHANT.
The most remarkable incident in the metropolis, since “the panic” in the neighbourhood of the Royal Exchange, in January, 1826, was the death of the celebrated elephant at Exeter Change, in March of the same year; not that it is attempted to insinuate comparison between these events, as to their nature or consequences, but it may fairly be observed, that each produced what is commonly called “a sensation” in town and country, and that each originated in peculiar excitement.
Wishing to record the death of the elephant in this work, and to relate only what is true, I resorted to Mr. Cross, whose menagerie has sustained a bereavement that can only be supplied, if it ever can be supplied, at a vast expense, and after a long lapse of time. On explaining my wish and purpose, Mr. Cross readily assented to furnish me with the information I desired, and communicated the following particulars. I committed them to paper during my interviews, and after digesting them into order, submitted the whole to his revision. Except as to mere language and occasional illustrations, the narrative is, in fact, the narrative of Mr. Cross. It differs in many essential respects from other accounts, but it only so differs, because every statement is accurately related from Mr. Cross’s lips. Circumstances which occurred during his temporary absence at the critical moment, were supplied to me in his presence by Mr. Tyler, the gentleman who arranged and cooperated with Mr. Herring, during the exigency that rendered the destruction of the elephant imperative.
The first owner of the lordly animal, now no more, was Mr. Harris, proprietor of Covent-garden theatre. He purchased it in July, 1810, for nine hundred guineas on its arrival in England, aboard the Astel, Captain Hay, and the elephant “came out” as a public performer the same year, in the procession of a grand pantomime, called “Harlequin Padmanaba.” Mrs. Henry Johnstone was his graceful rider, and he was “played up to” by the celebrated columbine, Mrs. Parker, whose husband had a joint interest with Mr. Harris in the new performer. During his “engagement” at this theatre, Mr. Polito “signed articles” with Messrs. Harris and Parker for his further “appearance in public” at the Royal Menagerie, Exeter Change. On the death of Mr. Polito, in 1814, Mr. Cross, who for twenty years had been superintendent of the concern, became its purchaser, and the elephant, thus transferred, remained with Mr. Cross till the termination of his life. From his “last farewell” to the public at Covent-garden theatre, he was stationary at the menagerie, from whence he was never removed, and, consequently, he was never exhibited at any other place.
On the elephant’s first arrival from India he had two keepers; these accompanied him to Exeter Change, and to their controul he implicitly submitted, until the death of one of them, within the first year after Mr. Cross’s proprietorship, when the animal’s increasing bulk and strength rendered it necessary to enlarge his den, or rather to construct a new one. The bars of the old one were not thicker than a man’s arm. With Mr. Harrison, the carpenter, who built his new den, and with whom he had formed a previous intimacy, he was remarkably docile, and accommodated himself to his wishes in every respect. He was occasionally troublesome to his builder from love of play, but the prick of a gimblet was an intimation he obeyed, till a desire for fresh frolic prompted him to further interference, and then a renewal of the hint, or some trifling eatable from the carpenter’s pocket, abated the interruption. In this way they went on together till the work was completed, and while the elephant retained his senses, he was happy in every opportunity that afforded him the society of his friend Harrison. The den thus erected will be particularized [presently]: it was that wherein he remained till his death.
About six years ago this elephant indicated an excitement which is natural to the species, and which prevails every year for a short season. At the period now spoken of, his keeper having gone into his den to exhibit him, the animal refused obedience; on striking him with a slight cane, as usual, the elephant violently threw him down: another keeper seeing the danger, tossed a pitchfork to his comrade, which the animal threw aside like a straw. A person then ran to alarm Mr. Cross, who hurried down stairs, and catching up a shovel, struck the animal violently on the head, and suddenly seizing the prostrated man, dragged him from the den, and saved his life.
This was the first appearance of those annual paroxysms, wherein the elephant, whether wild or confined, becomes infuriated. At such a period it is customary in India to liberate the elephants and let them run to the forests, whence, on the conclusion of the fit, they usually return to their wonted subjection. Such an experiment being impossible with Mr. Cross, he resorted to pharmacy, and, in the course of fifty-two hours, succeeded in deceiving his patient into the taking of twenty-four pounds of salts, twenty-four pounds of treacle, six ounces of calomel, an ounce and a half of tartar emetic, and six drams of powder of gamboge. To this he added a bottle of croton oil, the most potent cathartic perhaps in existence; of this, a full dram was administered, which alone is sufficient for at least sixty full doses to the human being; yet, though united with the preceding enormous quantity of other medicine, it operated no apparent effect. At this juncture Mr. Nyleve, a native East Indian, and a man of talent, suggested to Mr. Cross the administration of animal oil, as a medicine of efficacy. Six pounds of marrow from beef bones were accordingly placed within his reach, as if it had been left by accident; the liquorish beast, who would probably have refused it had it been tendered him in his food, swallowed the bait. The result justified Mr. Nyleve’s prediction. To my inquiry whether the marrow had not accelerated an operation which would have succeeded the previous administration, Mr. Cross answered, that he believed the beef marrow was the really active medicine, because, after an interval of three weeks, he gave the same quantity wholly unaccompanied, and the same aperient effect followed. He never, however, could repeat the experiment; for the elephant in successive years wholly refused the marrow, however attempted to be disguised, or with whatever it was mixed.
In subsequent years, during these periods of excitement, the paroxysms successively increased in duration; but there was no increase of violence until the present year, when the symptoms became more alarming, and medicine produced no diminution of the animal’s heightened rage. On Sunday, (the 26th of February,) a quarter of a pound of calomel was given to him in gruel. Three grains of this is a dose for a man; and though the entire quantity given to the elephant was more than equal to six hundred of those doses, it failed of producing in him any other effect than extreme suspicion of any food that was tendered to him, if it at all varied in appearance from what he was accustomed to at other times. On Monday morning some warm ale was offered him in a bucket, for the purpose of assisting the operation of the calomel, but he would not touch it till Cartmell, his keeper, drank a portion of the liquor himself, when he readily took it. The fluid did not appear to accelerate the wished-for object; and, in fact, the calomel wholly failed to operate. Though in a state of constant irritation, he remained tolerably quiet throughout Monday and Tuesday, until Wednesday, the 1st of March, when additional medicine became necessary, and Mrs. Cross conceived the thought of giving it to him through some person whom the elephant had not seen, and whom therefore he might regard as a casual visiter, and not suspect. To a certain extent the feint succeeded. She sent some buns to him by a strange lad, in one of which a quantity of calomel had been introduced. He ate each bun from the boy’s hand till that with the calomel was presented; instead of conveying it to his mouth, he instantly dropped the bun, and crushed it with his foot. In this way he was accustomed to treat every thing of food that he disliked.
It was always considered that the elephant’s den was of sufficient strength and magnitude to accommodate, and be proof against any attack he was able to direct against it, even in his most violent displeasure. In the course of the four preceding years the front had sustained many hundred of his powerful lounges, without any part having been substantially injured, or the smallest portion displaced, or rendered rickety in the slightest degree; but on this morning, (Wednesday,) about ten o’clock, he made a tremendous rush at the front, wholly unexcited by provocation, and broke the tenon, or square end at the top of the hinge story-post, to which the gates are hung, from its socket or mortise in the massive cross beam above; and, consequently, the strong iron clamped gates which had hitherto resisted his many furious attacks upon them, lost their security. Mr. Cross was then absent from the menagerie, and, in the urgency of the moment, his friend Mr. Tyler, a gentleman of great coolness and faculty of arrangement, gave orders for a strong massy piece of timber to be placed in front of his den, as a temporary fixture against the broken story-post; and offered every thing he could think of to pamper, and, if possible, to allay the animal’s fury. On Mr. Cross’s arrival he rightly judged, that another such lounge would prostrate the gates; and, as it was known that Mr. Harrison, the carpenter of the den, who formerly possessed great influence over him, had now lost all power of controuling him, it was morally certain, that if any other persons attempted to repair the mischief in an effectual way, their lives would be forfeited. Mr. Cross, under these circumstances of imminent danger, instantly determined to destroy the elephant with all possible despatch, as the only measure he could possibly adopt for his own safety and the safety of the public. Having formed his resolution, he went without a moment’s delay to Mr. Gifford, chemist in the Strand, and requested to be supplied with a potent poison, destitute if possible of taste or smell. Mr. Gifford, sensible of the serious consequences to Mr. Cross in a pecuniary point of view, entreated him to reflect still further, and not to commit an act of which he might hereafter repent. Mr. Cross assured him that whatever irritation he might manifest, proceeded from his own feelings of regard towards the elephant, heightened by a sense of the loss that would ensue upon his purpose being effected; adding, that he had a firm conviction that unless the animal’s death was immediately accomplished, loss of human life must ensue. Mr. Gifford replied, that he had never seen or complied more reluctantly with his wish on any occasion, and he gave him four ounces of arsenic. Mr. Cross declares that on his way back, the conflict of his feelings was so great at that moment, that he imagines no person contemplating murder could endure greater agony. The arsenic was mixed with oats, and a quantity of sugar being added by way of inducement, it was offered to the elephant as his ordinary meal by his keeper. The sagacious animal wholly refused to touch it.
His eyes now glared like lenses of glass reflecting a red and burning light. In order to soothe him, some oranges, to which fruit he had great liking, were repeatedly proffered; but though these were in a pure state, he took them, one after the other, as they were presented to him, and dropping each on the floor of his den instantly squelched it with his foot, and having thus disposed of a few he refused to take another. This utter rejection of food, with amazing increase of fury, heightened Mr. Cross’s alarm. He again went out, and in great agitation procured half an ounce of corrosive sublimate to be mixed in a quantity of conserve of roses, securely tied in a bladder, to prevent, if possible, any scent from the poison, and with some hope that if the animal detected any effluvia through the air-tight skin it would be the odour of roses and sugar, which were substances peculiarly grateful to him. The elephant was accustomed to swallow several things lying about within reach of his proboscis, which, if tendered to him, he would have refused; and this habit suggesting the possibility that he might so dispose of this, which, it was quite certain, if presented would have been rejected, the ball was placed so that he might find it; but the instant he perceived it he seemed to detect the purpose; he hastily seized it, and as hastily letting it fall, violently smashed it with his foot.
The peril was becoming greater every minute. The elephant’s weight was upwards of five tons, and from such an animal’s excessive rage, in a place of insecure confinement, the most terrible consequences were to be feared. Mr. Cross therefore intrusted his friend, Mr. Tyler, to direct and assist the endeavours of the keepers for the controul of the infuriated beast. He then despatched a messenger to his brother-in-law, Mr. Herring, in the New Road, Paddington, a man of determined resolution, and an excellent shot, stating the danger, and requesting him to come to the menagerie. As he arrived without arms, they went together to Mr. Stevens, gunsmith, in High Holborn, for rifles. On their way to him they called at Surgeons-hall, Lincoln’s-Inn Fields, where they hoped to see the skeleton of an elephant, in order to form a judgment of the places through which the shots would be likeliest to reach the vital parts. In this they were disappointed, the college of surgeons not having the skeleton of the animal in its collection; but Mr. Clift, who politely received them, communicated what information he possessed on the subject. Mr. Stevens lent him three rifles, and at his house Mr. Cross left Mr. Herring to get the pieces ready, after instructing him to cooperate with Mr. Tyler, in attempting the destruction of the animal, if it should be absolutely necessary before he returned himself. From thence Mr. Cross hastened to Great Marlborough-street, for the advice of Mr. Joshua Brookes, the eminent anatomist. He found that gentleman in his theatre, delivering a public lecture. Sense of danger deprived Mr. Cross of the attentions due to time and place under ordinary circumstances, and he immediately addressed Mr. Brookes; “Sir, a word with you, if you please, immediately: I have not an instant to lose.” Mr. Brookes concluded his lecture directly and knowing Mr. Cross would not have intruded upon him except from extreme urgency, withdrew with him, and gave him such instructions as the case seemed to require. Mr. Cross, accompanied by one of Mr. Brookes’s pupils, hastened homeward. They were met near the menagerie by Mr. Tyler, who entreated Mr. Cross to run to Somerset-house and obtain military assistance from that place, for that they had been compelled to use the rifles in their own defence, and had put a number of shot in him without being able to get him down. Mr. Brookes’s pupil accompanied Mr. Tyler, to assist him, if possible, while Mr. Cross rapidly proceeded to Somerset-house, where he found a sentry on duty, who did not dare to quit his post, and referred him to the guard-room, where there were only two other privates and a corporal, who, at first, declared his utter inability to lend him either men or arms; but on the earnest entreaties of Mr. Cross for aid, and his repeated representations, that he would be responsible in purse and person, and compensate any consequences that could be incurred by a direliction from the formalities of military duty on so pressing an occasion, the corporal relented, and, with one of the privates, hastened to the menagerie.
Mr. Cross now met Herring, of the public office, Bow-street, to whom he communicated the situation of affairs at Exeter Change, and requested his assistance in obtaining arms. Herring suggested an application to Bow-street for that purpose. It appears that from accident they were not procurable there, and deeming it possible that they might be got at sir W. Congreve’s office, Mr. Cross ran thither, where he was also disappointed. Mr. Brooks, glassman of the Strand, informed Mr. Cross there were small arms in the neighbourhood of Somerset-house; these, on returning to that place, were discovered to be old howitzers, and, therefore, useless. From thence he went on board the police-ship stationed on the Thames, near Waterloo-bridge, expecting to find swivels, and was again disappointed; being informed, however, that swivels were fired during civic processions from Hawes’s soap manufactory, on the Surrey side of the river, near Blackfriars-bridge, he rowed over and obtained a swivel, with a few balls, and the head of a poker, and the assistance of one of Mr. Hawes’s men. The use for either, however, ceased to exist; for they arrived at the menagerie within a few minutes after the conclusion of such a scene as had never been exhibited in that place nor, probably, in any other in this country. The elephant was dead.
To describe the proceedings of Exeter Change, from the time of Mr. Cross’s leaving it, it is necessary to recur to the period of Mr. Herring’s appearance thither, on his return from Mr. Stevens’s, in Holborn, with the three rifles, and one of Mr. Stevens’s assistants. He found that the violence of the elephant had increased every minute from the period of his departure with Mr. Cross, and that at great personal hazard Mr. Tyler, with Cartmell and Newsam, and the other keepers, had prevented him from breaking down the front of the den.
The keepers faced him with long pikes or spears, to deter him as much as possible from efforts to liberate himself from the confinement, which at ordinary periods he had submitted to without restraint. When he lounged furiously at the bars, they assailed him with great bravery, and their threats and menaces prevented the frequency of his attacks. In this state of affairs Mr. Herring concurred with Mr. Tyler, that to wait longer for Mr. Cross would endanger the existence of every person present; and having communicated the fact to Mrs. Cross, who had the highest regard for the animal from his ordinary docility, she was convinced, by their representations, that his death must be accomplished immediately, and therefore assented to it.
For the information of persons not acquainted with the menagerie, it is necessary to state that it occupies the entire range of the floor above Exeter Change, the lower part of which edifice withinside is occupied by shops belonging to Mr. Clarke. This part of the building, on the business of the day being concluded, is closed every night by the strong folding gates at each end, which, when open, allow a free passage to the public through the Change. It will be perceived, therefore, that the flooring above is Mr. Cross’s menagerie, or, at least, that very important part of it which is allotted to his matchless collection of quadrupeds. A large arrangement of other animals is in other apartments, on a higher story. Nero, not Wombwell’s Nero, which was baited by that showman at Warwick, but a lion not only in every respect finer than his namesake, and, in short, the noblest of his noble species in England, occupies a den in the menagerie over the western door of the Change. Other lions and animals are properly secured in their places of exhibition, on each side of the room, and the east end is wholly occupied by the den of the elephant; its floor being supported by a foundation of brick and timber more than adequate to the amazing weight of the animal. The requisite strength and construction of this flooring necessarily raise it nearly two feet from the flooring of the other part of the menagerie, which, though amazingly stable, and capable of bearing any other beast in perfect safety, would have immediately given way beneath the tread of the elephant; and had he forced his den he must have fallen through.
As soon, therefore, as his sudden death was resolved on, Mr. Tyler went down to Mr. Clarke, and acquainting him with the danger arising out of the immediate necessity, suggested the instant removal of every person from the Change below, and the closing of the Change gates. Mr. Clarke, and all belonging to his establishment, saw the propriety of their speedy departure, and in a few minutes the gates were barred and locked. By the adoption of these precautions, if the elephant had broken down the floor no lives would have been lost, although much valuable property would have been destroyed; and, in the event contemplated, the animal himself would have been confined within the basement. Still, however, a slight exertion of his enormous strength could have forced the gates. If he had made his entry into the Strand, it is impossible to conjecture the mischief that might have ensued in that crowded thoroughfare, from his infuriated passion.
On Mr. Tyler’s return up stairs from Mr. Clarke, it was evident from the elephant’s extreme rage, that not a moment was to be lost. Three rifles therefore were immediately loaded, and Mr. Herring, accompanied by Mr. Stevens’s assistant entered the menagerie, each with a rifle, and took their stations for the purpose of firing. Mr. Tyler pointed out to the keepers the window places, and such recesses as they might fly to if the elephant broke through, and enjoining each man to select a particular spot as his own exclusive retreat, concluded by showing the danger of any two of them running to the same place for shelter. The keepers with their pikes, placed themselves in the rear of Mr. Herring and his assistant, who stood immediately opposite the den, at about the distance of twelve feet in the front. Mr. Herring requested Cartmell to call in his usual tone to the elephant when he exhibited him to visiters, on which occasions the animal was accustomed to face his friends with the hope of receiving something from their hands. Cartmell’s cry of “Chunee! Chunee! Chuneelah!” in his exhibiting tone, produced a somewhat favourable posture for his enemies, and he instantly received two bullets aimed from the rifles towards the heart; they entered immediately behind the shoulder blade, at the distance of about three inches from each other. The moment the balls had perforated his body he made a fierce and heavy rush at the front, which further weakened the gates, shivered the side bar next to the dislodged story-post, and drove it out into the menagerie. The fury of the animal’s assault was terrific, the crash of the timbers, the hallooing of the keepers in their retreat, the calls for “rifles! rifles!” and the confusion and noise incident to the scene, rendered it indescribably terrific. The assailants rallied in a few seconds, and came pointing their spears with threats. Mr. Tyler having handed two other rifles, they were discharged as before; and, as before, produced a similar desperate lounge from the enraged beast at the front of his den. Had it been effective, and he had descended on the floor, his weight must have inevitably carried it, together with himself, his assailants, and the greater part of the lions, and other animals, into the Change below, and by possibility have buried the entire menagerie in ruins. “Rifles! rifles!” were again called for, and from this awful crisis it was only in the power of Mr. Tyler and some persons outside, to load quick enough for the discharge of one rifle at a time. The maddened animal turned round in his den incessantly, apparently with the design of keeping his head from the riflemen, who after the first two discharges could only obtain single shots at him. The shutter inside of a small grated window, which stood in a projection into the den, at one of the back corners, was now unshipped, and from this position Mr. Herring fired several shots through the grating. The elephant thus attacked in the rear as well as the front, flew round the den with the speed of a race-horse, uttering frightful yells and screams, and stopping at intervals to bound from the back against the front. The force of these rushes shook the entire building, and excited the most terrifying expectation that he would bring down the entire mass of wood and iron-work, and project himself among his assailants.
After the discharge of about thirty balls, he stooped and sunk deliberately on his haunches. Mr. Herring, conceiving that a shot had struck him in a vital part, cried out—“He’s down, boys! he’s down!” and so he was, but it was only for a moment: he leapt up with renewed vigour, and at least eighty balls were successively discharged at him from different positions before he fell a second time. Previous to that fall, Mr. Joshua Brookes had arrived with his son, and suggested to Mr. Herring to aim especially at the ear, at the eye, and at the gullet.
The two soldiers despatched from Somerset-house by Mr. Cross came in a short time before Mr. Brookes, and discharged about three or four rounds of ball cartridge, which was all the amunition they had. It is a remarkable instance of the animal’s subjection to his keeper, that though in this deranged state, he sometimes recognised Cartmell’s usual cry of “Chunee! Chunee! Chuneelah!” by sounds with which he was accustomed to answer the call, and that more than once, when Cartmell called out “Bite Chunee! bite!” which was his ordinary command to the elephant to kneel, he actually knelt, and in that position received the balls in the parts particularly desired to be aimed at. Cartmell, therefore, kept himself as much as possible out of view as one of the assailants, in order that his voice might retain its wonted ascendency. He and Newsam, and their comrades took every opportunity of thrusting at him. Cartmell, armed with a sword at the end of a pole, which he afterwards affixed to a rifle, pierced him several times.
On the elephant’s second fall he lay with his face towards the back of the den, and with one of his feet thrust out between the bars, so that the toes touched the menagerie floor. At this time he had from a hundred and ten to a hundred and twenty balls in him; as he lay in a posture, Cartmell thrust the sword into his body to the hilt. The sanguinary conflict had now lasted nearly an hour; yet, with astonishing alacrity, he again rose, without evincing any sign that he had sustained vital injury, though it was apparent he was much exhausted. He endeavoured to conceal his head by keeping his rear to the front; and lest he should either make a successful effort at the gate, or, on receiving his death-wound, fall backwards against it, which would inevitably have carried the whole away, the keepers availed themselves of the juncture to rapidly lash the gates of his den with a chain and ropes so securely, that he could not force them without bringing down the entire front.
Mr. Herring now directed his rifle constantly to the ear: one of these balls took so much effect, that the elephant suddenly rushed round from the blow, and made his last furious effort at the gates. Mr. Tyler describes this rush as the most awful of the whole. If the gates had not been firmly lashed, the animal must have come through; for, by this last effort, he again dislodged them, and they were kept upright by the chain and ropes alone. Mr. Herring from this time chiefly directed his fire at the gullet; at last he fell, but with so much deliberation, and in a position so natural to his usual habits, that he seemed to have lain down to rest himself. Mr. Herring continued to fire at him, and spears were ran into his sides, but he remained unmoved, nor did he stir from the first moment of his fall. Four or five discharges from a rifle into his ear produced no effect: it was evident that he was without sense, and that he had dropped dead, into the posture wherein he always lay when alive.
The fact that such an animal, of such prodigious size and strength, was destroyed in such a place, without an accident, from the commencement to the close of the assault, is a subject of real astonishment.
The situation of Mr. Cross’s menagerie, after the removal of the elephant, was equally and almost as agreeably surprising. A partial dissection took place on the Sunday, and in the course of the same day the body of the animal, with the skeleton, hide, and every particle of the remains, were removed. A stranger entering the place on Tuesday, ignorant of the recent event, could not have suspected such an occurrence. The menagerie was destitute of offensive smell, and, in every respect, preserved its usual appearance of order and cleanliness. Thus much is testified by the editor of the Every-Day Book from personal observation; and, if he were not too unwell to write more, he would add some interesting particulars respecting “Chuneelah,” which are necessarily deferred till the next sheet.
A representation of the outside front of the den seeming essential to the right understanding of the narrative, an [engraving] of it is added from a drawing made by Mr. John Cleghorn, the architectural draftsman, for that purpose. It is minutely correct in form and proportion, and shows the bar which the elephant broke and displaced in his last lounge. Though of solid oak, six inches square, it broke beneath his rush like a slight stick.
This engraving will be particularly referred to hereafter.
The Den of the Elephant at Exeter Change.
The posture of the animal as he lay dead, is shown by the [engraving] at the head of this article.
Several interesting anecdotes concerning elephants are extracted and subjoined from the Philosophical Transactions, Grose’s Voyage to the East Indies, Shaw’s Zoology, Goldsmith’s Animated Nature, the Gentleman’s Magazine, and other works and collections, some of which are named in the extracts themselves.
In the “London Magazine,” for 1761, there is an imperfect description of a large elephant, which is there called a “monstrous creature,” presented by the court of Persia to the king of Naples at that period. There is a detailed account of the animal by M. Nollet, in the “Philosophical Transactions” of the French Royal Academy. The “London” editor was so struck by this elephant’s enormous consumption of food, that he observes, “as the keeping of an elephant is so expensive, we may conclude that no old or full-grown one will ever be brought here for a show.” It is true that Mr. Cross’s elephant, on his arrival in this country, was neither old nor full-grown; but his exhibition falsifies the English editor’s presumption, that the great outlay for such an animal’s keep would be an effectual bar to such enterprise as we have seen manifested by Mr. Cross, whose elephant was in size, and other respects, greatly superior to the “enormous” elephant of his majesty of the Two Sicilies.
Bosinian observes, that the bullets to be made use of in hunting and killing the elephants, must be of iron, lead being too soft in its texture to do any execution. He says, “elephants are very difficult to be killed, unless the ball happens to light betwixt the eyes and the ears; to which end the bullet ought to be iron also. Their skin is as good proof against the common musket lead balls, as a wall; and if they hit the mentioned place become entirely flat.” Afterwards he says, “Those who pretended thoroughly to understand the elephant-shooting, told us, that we ought to have shot iron bullets, since those of lead are flatted, either by their bones, or the toughness of their skin.”
About the year 1767, a cutler at Sheffield in Yorkshire, in sawing an elephant’s tooth into proper laminæ or scantlings of ivory, met with a resistance which he had great difficulty to overcome. After he had got through the obstruction, it proved to be an iron bullet, lodged in the very body of the tooth, without any visible mark externally of the place where it entered.
In 1801, Mr. Charles Combe described to the Royal Society, an elephant’s tusk with the iron head of a spear thoroughly imbedded in it. From its position, he presumed it to have been forced by manual strength, through that part of the skull contiguous to the tusk; and that pursuing the natural course of the cavity, it pointed downwards towards the apex of the tusk.
Other substances foreign to the natural growth of the tusks of elephants, are frequently, found within them.
It is not until after the discharge of a hundred or perhaps double the number of rifles, that the elephant is slain in India, when he is chased by persons inured to the danger, and determined on his destruction. It will not excite astonishment, therefore, that Mr. Cross’s noble animal should have retained life under the firing of one hundred and fifty-two shots. There is an account of a splendid hunting party of a late Nawab Asuf-ud-Dowlah, who, with an immense retinue, took the field for the purpose of destroying every animal they met with. On a large plain overgrown with grass they discovered a wild elephant. The Nawab immediately formed a semicircle, with four hundred tame elephants, who were directed to advance and surround him. When the semicircle of elephants got within three hundred yards of the wild one, he looked amazed, but not frightened. Two large and fierce elephants were ordered to advance against him, but they were repulsed by a dreadful shock, and drove by the Nawab, who, as the wild one passed, ordered some of the strongest female elephants to go alongside and endeavour to entangle him with nooses and running knots; the attempt, however, was vain, as he snapped every rope, and none of the tame elephants could stop his progress. The Nawab, perceiving it impossible to catch him, ordered his death, and immediately a volley of above a hundred shots were fired. Many of the balls hit him, but he seemed unconcerned, and moved on towards the mountains. An incessant fire was kept up for nearly half an hour; the Nawab and most of his omras, or lords, used rifles, which carried two or three ounce balls but they made very little impression, and scarcely penetrated beyond the skin. Our author, who was mounted on a female elephant, went up repeatedly within ten yards of the wild one, and fired his rifle at his head; the blood gushed out, but the skull was invulnerable. Some of the Kandahar horses then galloped up and wounded the beast in several places. At length, being much exhausted with the loss of blood, from the number of wounds which he had received, he slackened his pace, and became quite calm and serene, as if determined to meet his approaching end. The horsemen, seeing him weak and slow, dismounted, and with their swords commenced a furious attack on the tendons of his hind legs, which were soon divided, and the operation completely disabled the poor animal from proceeding any further: he staggered, and then fell without a groan. The hatchet-men now advanced, and began to cut away his large ivory tusks, while the horsemen and soldiers in the most unfeeling manner attacked the dying creature with their swords. We can readily believe the writer, when he says the sight was very affecting. The noble animal still breathed, and breathed without a groan. He rolled his eyes in anguish on the surrounding crowd, and, making a last effort to rise, expired with a sigh.
Before gunpowder was invented, elephants were used by the nations of Asia and Africa for the purposes of war, and the kings of Ceylon, Pegu, and Arracan, have from time immemorial employed them for this use. Sharp sword-blades were fastened to their trunks, and upon their backs were fixed small wooden castles, containing five or six men, armed with javelins, and other missile weapons. The Greeks and Romans, however, soon learnt the best method of defence against these enormous warriors. They opened their ranks to let them pass through, and directed their whole attack against their riders. But since fire-arms have become the principal instruments of war, elephants, who are terrified both by the fire, and the noise of their discharge, would be of more detriment than advantage to the party that should employ them. Some of the Indian kings, however, still use armed elephants in their wars. In Cochin, and other parts of Malabar, all the soldiers that do not fight on foot are mounted upon elephants. This is also the case in Tonquin, Siam, and Pegu, where the use of fire-arms is but little known. The leader of the elephant sits astride upon his neck, and the combatants sit or stand upon other parts of his body. The elephants also prove very serviceable in passing rivers, and carry the baggage over on their backs. When their leaders have loaded them with a burden of several hundred weight, they tie cords to it, by which the soldiers hold fast and swim, or are drawn across the river. In battle, a heavy iron chain is sometimes fastened to the end of their trunk, which they swing about with such rapidity, as renders it impossible for an enemy to approach them. Another service which these animals perform in war, consists in forcing open the gates of besieged towns or fortresses. This they do, by stemming themselves with their haunches against the gates, and moving from side to side till they have broken the hinges, and forced open the gate. In order to prevent this, the besieged have generally large nails fixed in the gates, and projecting to a considerable length.
Elephants are also employed for transporting heavy ordnance over mountains, in doing which they show a singular degree of ingenuity. When oxen or horses are harnessed to a piece of ordnance, it requires the exertion of all their strength to draw it up an ascent. The elephant, in such cases, pushes the carriage forward with his forehead, and after every push, stems his knees against the wheels, whereby he prevents it from rolling back.
Wild elephants were caught and trained at an early period; since we find Arrian, who flourished about the 104th year of Christ, giving us the following account of the manner of taking elephants in India. The Indians enclose a large spot of ground, with a trench about twenty feet wide, and fifteen high, to which there is access but in one part, and this is a bridge, and is covered with turf; in order that these animals, who are very subtle, may not suspect what is intended. Of the earth that is dug out of the trench, a kind of wall is raised, on the other side of which a little kind of chamber is made, where people conceal themselves in order to watch these animals, and its entrance is very small. In this enclosure two or three tame female elephants are set. The instant the wild elephants see or smell them, they run and whirl about so much, that at last they enter the enclosure; upon which the bridge is immediately broken down, and the people upon the watch fly to the neighbouring villages for help. After they have been broken for few days by hunger and thirst, people enter the enclosure upon the tame elephants, and with these they attack them. As the wild ones are by this time very much weakened, it is impossible for them to make a long resistance. After throwing them on the ground, men get upon their backs, having first made a deep wound round their necks, about which they throw a rope, in order to put them to great pain in case they attempt to stir. Being tamed in this manner, they suffer themselves to be led quietly to the houses with the rest, where they are fed with grass and green corn, and tamed insensibly by blows and hunger, till such time as they obey readily their master’s voice, and perfectly understand his language.
In a description of the process of catching wild elephants, related by John Corse, Esq. in the “Asiatic Researches,” he interests the reader by an account of the escape of one which had been tamed, and of his submission to his keeper when he was recaptured. He says, in June, 1787, Jâttra-mungul, a male elephant taken the year before, was travelling in company with some other elephants towards Chittigong, laden with a tent, and some baggage for the accommodation of Mr. Buller and myself on the journey. Having come upon a tiger’s track, which elephants discover readily by the smell, he took fright and ran off to the woods in spite of the efforts of his driver. On entering the wood, the driver saved himself by springing from the elephant, and clinging to the branch of a tree, under which he was passing: when the elephant had got rid of his driver, he soon contrived to shake off his load. As soon as he ran away, a trained female was despatched after him, but could not get up in time to prevent his escape; she, however, brought back his driver, and the load he had thrown off, and we proceeded, without any hope of ever seeing him again.
Eighteen months after this, when a herd of elephants had been taken, and had remained several days in the enclosure, till they were enticed into the outlet, and there tied, and led out in the usual manner, one of the drivers, viewing a male elephant very attentively, declared that he resembled the one which had run away. This excited the curiosity of every one to go and look at him; but when any person came near, the animal struck at him with his trunk, and, in every respect, appeared as wild and outrageous as any of the other elephants. At length, an old hunter, coming up and examining him narrowly, declared he was the very elephant that had made his escape.
Confident of this, he boldly rode up to him, on a tame elephant, and ordered him to lie down, pulling him by the ear at the same time. The animal seemed quite taken by surprise, and instantly obeyed the word of command, with as much quickness as the ropes with which he was tied permitted; uttering at the same time a peculiar shrill squeak through his trunk, as he had formerly been known to do; by which he was immediately recognised by every person who had ever been acquainted with this peculiarity.
Thus we see that this elephant, for the space of eight or ten days, during which he was in the haddah, and even while he was tying in the outlet, appeared equally wild and fierce as the boldest elephant then taken; so that he was not even suspected of having been formerly taken, till he was conducted from the outlet. The moment, however, he was addressed in a commanding tone, the recollection of his former obedience seemed to rush upon him at once; and, without any difficulty, he permitted a driver to be seated on his neck, who in a few days made him as tractable as ever.
Bruce relates the Abyssinian mode of destroying the elephant from his own observation, during his return from Gondah, and while sojourning with Ayto Confu. His narrative is in these words.
Though we were all happy to our wish in this enchanted mountain, the active spirit of Ayto Confu could not rest. He was come to hunt the elephant, and hunt him he would. All those that understood any thing of this exercise had assembled from a great distance, to meet Ayto Confu at Tcherkin. He and Engedan, from the moment they arrived, had been overlooking from the precipice their servants training and managing their horses in the market-place below. Great bunches of the finest canes had been brought from Kawra for javelins; and the whole house was employed in fitting heads to them in the most advantageous manner. For my part, though I should have been very well contented to have remained where I was, yet the preparations for sport of so noble a kind roused my spirits, and made me desirous to join in it.
On the 6th, an hour before day, after a hearty breakfast, we mounted on horseback, to the number of about thirty, belonging to Ayto Confu. But there was another body, both of horse and foot, which made hunting the elephant their particular business. These men dwell constantly in the woods, and know very little of the use of bread, living entirely upon the flesh of the beasts they kill, chiefly that of the elephant or rhinoceros. They are exceedingly thin, light, and agile, both on horseback and foot; are very swarthy, though few of them black; none of them woolly-headed, and all of them have European features. They are called Agageer, a name of their profession, not of their nation, which comes from the word agar, and signifies to hough or hamstring with a sharp weapon. More properly it means the cutting of the tendon of the heel, and is a characteristic of the manner in which they kill the elephant, which is shortly as follows:
Two men, absolutely naked, without any rag or covering at all about them, get on horseback; this precaution is for fear of being laid hold of by the trees or bushes in making their escape from a very watchful enemy. One of these riders sits upon the back of the horse, sometimes with a saddle, and sometimes without one, with only a switch, or short stick in one hand, carefully managing the bridle with the other; behind him sits his companion, who has no other arms but a broad-sword, such as is used by Sclavonians, and which is brought from Trieste. His left hand is employed grasping the sword by the handle; about fourteen inches of the blade is covered with whipcord. This part he takes in his right hand, without any danger of being hurt by it; and, though the edges of the lower part of the sword are as sharp as a razor, he carries it without a scabbard.
As soon as the elephant is found feeding, the horseman rides before him as near his face as possible; or, if he flies, crosses him in all directions, crying out, “I am such a man and such a man; this is my horse, that has such a name; I killed your father in such a place, and your grandfather in such another place; and I am now come to kill you; you are but an ass in comparison of them.” This nonsense he verily believes the elephant understands, who, chased and angry at hearing the noise immediately before him, seeks to seize him with his trunk, or proboscis; and, intent upon this, follows the horse everywhere, turning and turning round with him, neglectful of making his escape by running straight forward, in which consists his only safety. After having made him turn once or twice in pursuit of the horse, the horseman rides close up alongside of him, and drops his companion just behind on the off side; and while he engages the elephant’s attention upon the horse, the footman behind gives him a drawn stroke just above the heel, or what in man is called the tendon of Achilles. This is the critical moment; the horseman immediately wheels round, takes his companion up behind him, and rides off full speed after the rest of the herd, if they have started more than one; and sometimes an expert agageer will kill three out of one herd. If the sword is good, and the man not afraid, the tendon is commonly entirely separated; and if it is not cut through, it is generally so far divided, that the animal, with the stress he puts upon it, breaks the remaining part asunder. In either case, he remains incapable of advancing a step, till the horseman’s return, or his companions coming up pierce him through with javelins and lances: he then falls to the ground, and expires with loss of blood.
The agageer nearest me presently lamed his elephant, and left him standing. Ayto Engedan, Ayto Confu, Guebra Mariam, and several others, fixed their spears in the other before the agageer had cut his tendons. My agageer however, having wounded the first elephant, failed in the pursuit of the second; and being close upon him at the entrance of the wood, he received a violent blow from the branch of a tree which the elephant had bent by his weight, and, after passing, allowed it to replace itself; when it knocked down both the riders, and very much hurt the horse. This, indeed, is the great danger in elephant-hunting; for some of the trees, that are dry and short, break by the violent pressure of so immense a body moving so rapidly, and fall upon the pursuers, or across the roads. But the greatest number of these trees being of a succulent quality, they bend without breaking, and return quickly to the former position, when they strike both horse and man so violently, that they often beat them to pieces. Dexterous too as the riders are, the elephant sometimes reaches them with his trunk, with which he dashes the horse against the ground, and then sets his feet upon him, till he tears him limb from limb with his proboscis; a great many hunters die this way. Besides this, the soil at this time of the year is split into deep chasms, or cavities, by the heat of the sun, so that nothing can be more dangerous than the riding.
The elephant once slain, they cut the whole of the flesh off his bones into thongs, like the reins of a bridle, and hang these like festoons upon the branches of trees, till they become perfectly dry, without salt; and then they lay them up for their provisions in the season of the rains.
A very interesting account of the affection of a young elephant for its mother, concludes Bruce’s description of this cruel amusement.
There now remained but two elephants of those that had been discovered, which were a she one with a calf. The agageer would willingly have let these alone, as the teeth of the female are very small, and the young one is of no sort of value, even for food, its flesh shrinking much upon dying; but the hunters would not be limited in their sport. The people having observed the place of her retreat, thither we eagerly followed. She was very soon found, and as soon lamed by the agageers; but when they came to wound her with their darts, as every one did in turn, to our very great surprise, the young one, which had been suffered to escape unheeded and unpursued, came out from the thicket, apparently in great anger, running upon the horses and men with all the violence it was master of. I was amazed, and as much as ever I was, upon such an occasion, afflicted at seeing the great affection of the little animal defending its wounded mother, heedless of its own life or safety. I therefore cried to them for God’s sake to spare the mother, though it was then too late; and the calf had made several rude attacks upon me, which I avoided without difficulty; but I am happy to this day in the reflection that I did not strike it. At last, making one of his attacks upon Ayto Engedan, it hurt him a little upon the leg; upon which he thrust it through with his lance, as others did after, and then it fell dead before its wounded mother, whom it had so affectionately defended.
The bodies of elephants are frequently oiled, to prevent the effects of the sun on them. They are fond of the water in hot weather, and seem delighted when they are rubbed with a brick, or any hard substance, on the upper part of the head. They are very sure-footed, have an active, shuffling gait, and generally travel about three or four miles an hour, but may be urged on to six when goaded by a man who runs behind the animal for that purpose. They are very fond of sugar-canes, and the leaves of the banyan; they can free a cocoa-nut from its tough coat, crack it, and take out the nut free from the shell. A small race of elephants, from five to six feet in height, are much used about the court in the northern part of India. When the elephant passes through a crowd, he is very careful to open a way with his trunk, that he may not injure any one. This observation is strengthened by M. d’Obsonville, who informs us that the baron de Lauriston was induced to go to Laknaor, the capital of the Soubah, or viceroyalty of that name, at a time when an epidemic distemper was making the greatest ravages amongst the inhabitants. The principal road to the palace gate was covered with the sick and dying, extended on the ground, at the very moment when the nabob must necessarily pass. It appeared impossible for the elephant to do otherwise than tread upon and crush many of these poor wretches in his passage, unless the prince would stop till the way could be cleared; but he was in haste, and such tenderness would be unbecoming in a personage of his importance. The elephant, however, without appearing to slacken his pace, and without having received any command for that purpose, assisted them with his trunk, removed some, and stepped over the rest with so much address and assiduity, that not one person was wounded.
The proboscis of the elephant is the most distinguishing character in his formation. It is hollow all along, but with a partition running from one end of it to the other; so, though outwardly it appears like a single pipe, it is inwardly divided into two. This fleshy tube is composed of nerves and muscles, covered with a proper skin of a blackish colour, like that of the rest of the body. It is capable of being moved in every direction, of being lengthened and shortened, of being bent or straightened, so pliant as to embrace any body it is applied to, and yet so strong, that nothing can be torn from the gripe. To aid the force of this grasp, there are little eminences, like a caterpillar’s feet, on the underside of this instrument, which, without doubt, contribute to the sensibility of the touch as well as to firmness of the hold. Through this trunk the animal breathes, drinks, and smells, as through a tube; and at the very point of it, just above the nostrils, there is an extension of the skin, about five inches long, in the form of a finger, and which, in fact, answers all the purposes of one; for, with the rest of the extremity of the trunk, it is capable of assuming different forms at will, and, consequently, of being adapted to the minutest objects. By means of this the elephant can take a pin from the ground, untie the knots of a rope, unlock a door, and even write with a pen. “I have myself seen,” says Ælian, “an elephant writing Latin characters on a board, in a very orderly manner, his keeper only showing him the figure of each letter. While thus employed, the eyes might be observed studiously cast down upon the writing, and exhibiting an appearance of great skill and erudition.” It sometimes happens that the object is too large for the trunk to grasp; in such a case the elephant makes use of another expedient, as admirable as any of the former. It applies the extremity of the trunk to the surface of the object, and, sucking up its breath, lifts and sustains such a weight as the air in that case is capable of suspending. In this manner this instrument is useful in most of the purposes of life; it is an organ of smelling, of touching, and of suction; it not only provides for the animal’s necessities and comforts, but it also serves for its ornament and defence.
Mr. Corse affirms, that the usual height of the male Asiatic elephant is from eight to ten feet, and, in one instance only, he saw one of ten feet six inches. The young one at its birth is thirty-five inches; one grew eleven inches in the first year; eight, six, and five, in the three succeeding years. The full growth is at nineteen years. He says, elephants that have escaped from confinement have not sagacity to avoid being retaken, and they will breed in confinement. The young, he observes, begin to nibble and suck the breast soon after birth, pressing it with the trunk, which, by mutual instinct, they know will make the milk flow more readily into their mouths while sucking. Elephants never lie down to give their young ones suck; and it often happens, when the dam is tall, that she is obliged, for some time, to bend her body towards her young, to enable him to reach the nipple with his mouth; consequently, if ever the trunk were used to lay hold of the nipple, it would be at this period, when he is making laborious efforts to reach it with his mouth, but which he could always easily do with his trunk if it answered the purpose. In sucking, the young elephant always grasps the nipple, which projects horizontally from the breast, with his mouth. Mr. Corse often observed this; and so sensible were the attendants of it, that, with them, it is a common practice to raise a small mound of earth, about six or eight inches high, for the young one to stand on, and to save the mother the trouble of bending her body every time she gives suck, which she cannot readily do when tied to her picket. Tame elephants are never suffered to remain loose in India, as instances occur of the mother leaving even her young and escaping into the woods. Another circumstance deserves notice: if a wild elephant happens to be separated from her young for only two days, though giving suck, she never afterwards recognises it. This separation happened, sometimes, unavoidably, when they were enticed, separately, into the kiddah.
Elephants in India are taught to reverence the various sovereigns to whom they belong, when they appear in his presence. They are then trained to warfare, and rushing upon the enemy, as if conscious of their superior strength, beat down all before them. They have even been known to brave the hottest fire of the enemy’s artillery. Beauleu, in his “Voyage to the East Indies,” mentions that the king of Achen places his whole strength in nine hundred elephants, which are bred to tread fire under their feet, and to be unmoved at the shot of cannon, and likewise to salute the king when they pass by his apartments, by bending their knees, and raising their trunks three times. This traveller adds, that they are influenced by exemplary punishment; and gives an instance of the fact. The king of Achen, he says, having ordered the embarkation of a hundred elephants for the siege of Dehly, when they were brought to the coast not one of them would enter the ship. The king being acquainted with their behaviour, went in person to the shore, and after expressing passion and rage at their disobedience, ordered one of them to be cut asunder in the presence of the rest; on which they all peaceably embarked, and were more than ordinary tractable during the whole voyage.
White elephants are reverenced throughout the east, and the Chinese pay them a certain kind of worship. The Burmese monarch is called the “king of the white elephants,” and is regarded under that title with more than the ordinary veneration which oriental despotism exacts from its abject dependants.
The little island of Elephanta, opposite to the fort of Bombay, derives its name from a sculptured figure in stone, of the natural colour, and ordinary size, of the animal. It is elevated on a platform of stone of the same colour, and on the back of this granite elephant was a smaller one, apparently of the same stone, which had been broken off. There is no history, nor any well grounded tradition, relative to this statue. The island itself is distinguished for extraordinary antiquities, particularly a magnificent temple hewn out of the solid rock, adorned by the arts of sculpture and painting with statues and pictures, probably of more remote age than the earliest efforts of Greek or Roman genius. Many of these venerable representations suffered irreparable injury, and vast numbers were wholly destroyed, by the barbarian ravages of the Portuguese, who formerly obtained possession of the place, and dragged field-pieces to the demolition of these the most curious, and, possibly, the most ancient monuments of oriental grandeur. Queen Catharine of Portugal, who held the island in dower, was so sensible of the importance of this spot, that she imagined it impossible that any traveller on that side of India would return without exploring the wonders of the “Cave of Elephanta.” The island is destitute of all other interest.
That elephants are susceptible of the most tender attachment to each other, is evinced by the following occurrence, which is recorded in a French journal:—Two very young elephants, a male and a female, were brought from the island of Ceylon to Holland. They had been separated from each other in order to be conveyed from the Hague to the Museum of Natural History, in Paris, where a spacious stable had been constructed for them. This was divided into two partitions, which communicated to each other by means of a trap-door. Both of the divisions were surrounded with strong wooden paling. The morning after their arrival they were brought into this habitation: the male elephant was introduced first. With an air of suspicion he examined the place, tried each of the beams by shaking it with his trunk to see if it was fast. He endeavoured to turn round the large screws which held them on the outside, but this he found impracticable. When he came to the trap-door between the two partitions, he discovered that it was secured only by a perpendicular iron bolt, which he lifted up, pushed open the door, and went into the other partition, where he ate his breakfast.
It was with great difficulty that these animals had been separated in order to be conveyed singly to Paris, and having now not seen each other for several months, the joy they expressed at meeting again is not to be described. They immediately ran to each other, uttered a cry of joy that shook the whole building, and blew the air out of their trunks with such violence, that it seemed like the blast of a smith’s bellows. The pleasure which the female experienced seemed to be the most lively; she expressed it by moving her ears with astonishing rapidity, and tenderly twining her trunk round the body of the male. She laid it particularly to his ear, where she held it for a considerable time motionless, and after having folded it again round his whole body, she applied it to her own mouth. The male in like manner folded his trunk round the body of the female; and the pleasure which he felt at their meeting seemed to be of a more sentimental cast, for he expressed it by shedding an abundance of tears. Afterwards they had constantly one stable in common, and the mutual attachment between them excited the admiration of every beholder.
The following example shows that elephants are capable also of forming attachments to animals of a different species.
An elephant which the Turkish emperor sent as a present to the king of Naples, in the year 1740, displayed a particular attachment towards a ram, that was confined, together with some other animals, in his stable. He even permitted him to butt at him with his horns, as these animals are wont to do. But if the ram abused the liberty he gave him, the only punishment he inflicted upon him for it was, that he took him up with his trunk, and threw him upon a dung-heap, though if any of the other animals attempted to take liberties with him, he dashed them with such violence against the wall, that he killed them on the spot.
An elephant, rendered furious by the wounds he had received in an engagement at Hambour, rushed into the plain uttering the most hideous cries. A soldier, whose comrades made him sensible of his danger by calling to him, was unable on account of his wounds, to retreat with sufficient expedition out of the way of the enraged animal. But the elephant, when he came to him, seemed to be apprehensive lest he should trample him with his feet, raised him with his trunk, and having laid him gently on one side, continued his progress.
At Mahie, on the coast of Malabar, the owner of an elephant lent him out for hire. His occupation consisted in drawing timber for building out of a river, which he performed very dexterously with his trunk, under the guidance of a boy. He then piled the beams upon each other with such regularity, that no human being could have done it better.
Elephants do not merely obey the commands of their keeper while he is present, but they perform also in his absence the most singular operations when they have previously been made acquainted with the nature of them. I once saw, says M. d’Obsonville, two elephants employed in demolishing a wall, in obedience to the orders previously received from their cornacks, who had encouraged them to undertake the task by a promise of fruit and brandy. They united their powers, placed their trunks together, which were defended by a covering of leather, and pushed with them against the strongest part of the wall; repeated their efforts, carefully watching at the same time the effect of the equilibrium, which they followed till the whole was sufficiently loose, when they exerted their whole strength in one more push, after which they speedily retreated out of the reach of danger, and the whole wall fell to the ground.
Bosmann relates, that in December, 1700, an elephant came at six o’clock in the morning towards Fort Mina, on the Gold Coast, and took his road along the river at the foot of Mount St. Jago. Some of the negroes ran unarmed about him, which he permitted without appearing to be in the least degree suspicious of them. But a Dutch officer shot at him, and wounded him over his eye. The animal did not alter his course, but pricking his ears, proceeded to the Dutch garden, where he saw the director-general and other officers belonging to the fort, sitting under the shade of some palm-trees. He had torn down about a dozen of these trees with the greatest facility, when upwards of an hundred bullets were discharged at him. He bled over his whole body, but still kept his legs, and did not halt in the least. A negro now, to plague the elephant, pulled him by the tail, at which the animal, being provoked, seized him with his trunk, threw him to the ground, and thrust his tusks twice through his body. As soon as the negro was killed, he turned from him, and suffered the other negroes to take away his body unmolested. He now remained upwards of an hour longer in the garden, and seemed to have directed his attention to the Dutchmen who were sitting at a distance of fifteen or sixteen paces from him. As these had expended their ammunition, and feared that the elephant might attack them, they made their retreat. In the mean time the elephant was come to another gate, and although the garden-wall consisted of a double row of stones, he easily threw it down, and went out by the breach. He then walked slowly to a rivulet, and washed off the blood with which he was covered: after that he returned to the palm-trees, and broke some boards that were placed there for the purpose of building a vessel. The Dutchmen had in the mean time procured a fresh supply of powder and ball, and their repeated shots at length put the elephant out of condition to make further resistance. They then with great difficulty cut off his trunk, upon which the elephant, who till then had not uttered a sound, set up a hideous roar, threw himself down under a tree, and expired.
Further particulars concerning Elephants generally.
The elephant is not an enemy to any other animal. It is said that the mouse is the only quadruped that is an enemy to him, and that this little quadruped holds him in perpetual fear. He sleeps with the end of his proboscis so close to the earth, that nothing but the air he breathes can get between; for the mouse is affirmed to enter its orifice, when he finds it possible, and, making his way to the elephant’s vital parts in search of food or shelter, by that means destroys the mighty tenement wherein his own littleness is ensconced.
The great dean of St. Paul’s, if he may be so called without disparagement to Colet, has two noble stanzas on this subject on “The Progress of the Soul.” They were read to the editor of the Every-Day Book, by one of the kindest of human beings, himself a poet, from his own copy of the book wherein the hand of a friend, the greatest living poet, and perhaps the greatest mind of our country hath penned, that “Donne’s rhythm was as inexplicable to the many as blank verse, spite of his rhymes.—Not one in a thousand of his readers have any notion how his lines are to be read. To read Dryden, Pope, &c. you need only count syllables; but to read Donne you must measure time, and discover the time of each word by the sense and passion.” Having presumed on the wonted indulgence of friendship, by this transcription from the manuscript notes of a borrowed volume, for counsel and caution in the present reader’s behalf, the verses are submitted to his regard.
Natures great master-piece, an Elephant,
The onely harmelesse great thing; the giant
Of beasts; who thought none had, to make him wise,
But to be just, and thankful, loth t’ offend
(Yet nature hath given him no knees to bend)
Himself he up-props, on himself relies,
And foe to none; suspects no enemies,
Still sleeping stood; vext not his fantasie
Black dreams, like an unbent bow carelessly
His sinewy Proboscis did remisly lie.
In which as in a gallery this mouse
Walk’d and survey’d the rooms of this vast house,
And to the brain, the soul’s bed chamber, went,
And gnaw’d the life cords there; Like a whole town
Clean undermin’d the slain beast tumbled down;
With him the murth’rer dies, whom envy sent
To kill, not scape; for onely he that meant
To die, did ever kill a man of better roome;
And thus he made his foe, his prey and tombe:
Who cares not to turn back, may any whither come.
Donne.
The “elephant,” according to Randle Holme, is regarded, in heraldry, as “the emblem of vigilance, nec jacet in somno; but, like a faithful watchman, sleeps in a sentinel’s posture; it denoteth strength, ingenuity, and ambition of people’s praise; it signifieth also meekness and devotion.” He mentions an elephant argent on a shield gules, that “this coat is born by the name of Elphinston.” Describing that “they (the elephant) are a great and vast creature,” he says, that “an elephant’s head erased gules,” on a shield argent, “is borne, by the name of Brodric.” In explanation of this bearing, Holme’s knowledge seems to have been more correct in heraldry than in natural history, for he declares that “this should be termed a she-elephant, or the head of a female elephant; by reason his tusks or teeth stand upwards, and the male stands downwards; but this,” says our lamenting herald, “is a thing in heraldry not observed.” He positively affirms, that “it were sufficient distinction for a coat of arms between families” (!) as much a distinction “as the bearing of a ram and a ewe, or a lion with red claws, and another with yellow; and much more (distinctive) than ermyne and ermynites, (they) being both one, save (that) the last hath one hair of red on each side of every one of the poulderings: a thing little regarded, makes a great alteration in arms.” His discrepant distinctions between the male and female are exceedingly amusing, and he is quite as diverting with their trunks. He figures their “snowts inwards, or snowts respected,” which, he says, is “a term used when things (either quick or dead) are, as it were, regarding or looking one at another.” Then he gives a bearing “Argent out of a coronet or; two proboscides (or trunks) of two elephants reflected endorsed, gules, each adorned with three trefoils, vert. This” says Holme, “is a very great bearing amongst the Dutch, as their books of herauldry inform me; for there is scores of those families, bear the elephant’s trunk thus: some adorned with roses, leaves, pendants, crosses, or with other varieties of things, each set at a certain distance from the trunk by a footstalk. Now,” he goes on to say, with a hand most carefully pointing to the important fact, thus—“☞Now, in the blazon of such coates, you must first observe the reflection of the proboscides, whether the snowts stand respected, or endorsed; and then to tell the exact number of things, each one is endorsed withall: for in some, they will have one thing apeece, others 2, 3, 4, 5, &c. Some, again, will have (with the sides, and others without the sides, adorning,) such and such things set in the concave or hole of the snowt.” He refers to precedents for these essential particulars, and in a page, wherein he assigns “the left arm of a devil, or fiend with a devil-like foot,” for “the coat of Spittachar,” he gives to “the name of Oberstagh,” on a field argent, “the proboscide of an elephant erected and couped, bowed or imbowed, or; maned, or haired, to the middle, azure; and collared at the bottom with an hawk’s bill fixed thereunto, gules; out of the snowte, a Dutch fane pendant sable.” So likewise by taking, for your guide, his descriptions under a “demy talbot, his feet converted, turned, or metamorphosed into elephants’ snowts, with two flowers de lis issuant, you shall have demy men, women, lions, and other creatures born with several sorts of things in the places of hands and feet.” We will not, however, travel on his “elephants’ snouts in coat armour,” beyond a field or, with “the proboscide of an elephant, erected, flexed and recurved gules, issuing out of a pierced place; towards the basis thereof, a rose-sprig vertant et revertant, about the trunk to the middle thereof proper.” According to Holme, this elegant bearing may be claimed by any reader who has the happiness to bear “the name of Van Snotflough.” Concerning, however, “snowts bowed, and imbowed, erected and couped,” Holme guardedly adds that “these things, though I from my author, and from their similitude to an elephant’s trunk, have all along termed them so, yet, in my judgment they would pass better for horns, and I take them to be absolute horns.” Thus, “at one fell swoop,” when destitute readers may be large with speculation raised by our friend Holme, he disturbs their fond regards, and they who contemplate glorious “atchievements” with the “proboscides of elephants,” must either content themselves with “absolute horns,” or gaze on empty “fields.”
In several parts of India, elephants are employed to perform upon criminals the office of an executioner. With their trunks they break the limbs of the culprit, trample him to death, or impale him upon their tusks, according as they are ordered by their master.
This use of elephants in the east, and their sagacity, is alluded to by one of our poets:—
Borri records their strength of parts,
Extent of thought, and skill in arts;
How they perform the law’s decrees,
And save the state the hangman’s fees:
And how by travel understand
The language of another land.
Let those who question this report
To Pliny’s ancient page resort;
How learn’d was that sagacious breed,
Who now, like them, the Greek can read.
Gay.
The author of “The Chase” elegantly describes one of the devices by which the elephant is caught in his own domains:—
On distant Ethiopia’s sunburnt coasts,
The black inhabitants a pitfall frame,
With slender poles the wide capacious mouth,
And hurdles slight, they close; o’er these is spread
A floor of verdant turf, with all its flowers
Smiling delusive, and from strictest search
Concealing the deep grave that yawns below.
Then boughs of trees they cut, with tempting fruit
Of various kinds surcharg’d, the downy peach,
The clustering vine, and of bright golden rind
The fragrant orange. Soon as evening grey
Advances slow, besprinkling all around
With kind refreshing dews the thirsty globe,
The stately elephant from the close shade
With step majestic strides, eager to taste
The cooler breeze, that from the sea-beat shore
Delightful breathes, or in the limpid stream
To lave his panting sides; joyous he scents
The rich repast, unweeting of the death
That lurks within. And soon he sporting breaks
The brittle boughs, and greedily devours
The fruit delicious. Ah! too dearly bought;
The price is life. For now the treacherous turf
Trembling gives way; and the unwieldy beast
Self sinking, drops into the dark profound.
So when dilated vapours, struggling, heave
Th’ incumbent earth; if chance the cavern’d ground
Shrinking subside, and the thin surface yield,
Down sinks at once the ponderous dome, ingulph’d
With all its towers.
Somervile.
According to Bayle, the Romans called elephants Boves Lucas, because, as it is reported, they saw them for the first time in Lucania, during a great battle with Pyrrhus. The issue of the conflict was extremely doubtful, for the ground on both sides was lost and won seven times; but, at last, the Epirotes got the victory by means of their elephants, whose smell frighted the Roman horses. In a subsequent engagement they were fatal to Pyrrhus; they threw his troops into disorder, and the Romans were victorious.
Elephantiasis is a disease in man, deriving its name from the elephant, who is also afflicted with a similar disorder. It is also called the Arabian leprosy. Medical treatises describe its appearances, mode of cure in the human being. As few readers possess elephants, it will not be necessary to say more of it, than that it is cutaneous; and that to prevent it in the elephant, the Indians apply oil to the animal’s skin, which, to preserve its pliancy, they frequently bathe with the unctuous fluid.
Some parts of the elephant’s skin, which are not callous, are seized upon by flies, and they torture the animal exceedingly. His tail is too short to reach any portion of his body, and his trunk alone is insufficient to defend him from myriads of his petty enemies. In his native forests he snaps branches from the trees, and with his trunk brushes off his tormentors, and fans the air to prevent their settling on him. In a confined state, he converts a truss of hay into a wisp for the same purpose; and he often gathers up the dust with his trunk and covers the sensible places.
It is related by M. Navarette, that at Macassar, an elephant driver had a cocoa nut given him, which, out of wantonness, he struck twice against his elephant’s forehead to break, and that, the day following, the animal saw some cocoa nuts exposed in the street for sale, one of which he took up with his trunk, and beat it about the driver’s head, till the man was completely dead. “This comes,” says our author, “of jesting with elephants.”
A sentinel at the Menagerie in Paris, used often to desire the visitors not to give the elephants any thing to eat. This admonition was particularly disagreeable to the female elephant, and she took a great dislike to the sentinel. She had several times endeavoured to make him desist from interfering, by squirting water over his head, but without effect. One day, when several persons came to see these animals, one of them offered a piece of bread to the female, which being perceived by the sentinel, just as he was opening his mouth to repeat his usual admonition, the elephant stepped opposite to him, and threw a large quantity of water into his face. This excited the laughter of all the by-standers; but the sentinel coolly wiped his face, placed himself a little on one side, and was as usual very vigilant. Not long after he again found occasion to repeat his former admonition to the spectators; but scarcely had he done it when the elephant tore his musket out of his hand, wound her trunk round it, trod upon it, and did not deliver it again to him till after she had twisted it completely into the form of a screw.
A person resident in Ceylon, near a place where elephants were daily led to water, often used to sit at the door of his house, and occasionally to give to one of these animals some fig-leaves, a food to which elephants are very partial. Once he took it into his head to play the elephant a trick. He wrapped a stone round with fig-leaves, and said to the cornack (the keeper of the elephants) “This time I will give him a stone to eat, and see how it will agree with him.” The cornack answered, “that the elephant would not be such a fool as to swallow the stone.” The man, however, reached the stone to the elephant, who taking it with his trunk applied it to his mouth, and immediately let it fall to the ground. “You see,” said the cornack, “that I was right.” Saying these words, he drove away his elephants, and after having watered them, was conducting them again to their stable. The man who had played the elephant the trick with the stone was still sitting at his door, when, before he was aware, the animal made at him, threw his trunk round him, and dashing him to the ground trampled him immediately to death.
All Naples, says Sonnini, in one of his notes to Buffon’s “Natural History,” has witnessed the docility and sagacity of an elephant that belonged to the king. He afforded great assistance to the masons that were at work upon the palace, by reaching them the water they required, which he fetched in large copper vessels from a neighbouring well. He had observed that these vessels were carried to the brazier’s when they wanted any repair. Observing, therefore, one day that the water ran out at the bottom of one of them, he carried it of his own accord to the brazier, and having waited while it was repairing, received it again from him, and returned to his work. This elephant used to go about the streets of Naples without ever injuring any one: he was fond of playing with children, whom he took up with his trunk, placed them on his back, and set them down again on the ground without their ever receiving the smallest hurt.
There is a remarkable instance of an elephant’s attachment to a very young child. The animal was never happy but when it was near him: the nurse used, therefore, very frequently to take the child in its cradle, and place it between his feet, and this he became at length so accustomed to, that he would never eat his food except when it was present. When the child slept he used to drive off the flies with his proboscis, and when it cried he would move the cradle backward and forward, and thus again rock it to sleep.
Ælian relates that a man of rank in India, having very carefully trained up a female elephant, used daily to ride upon her, and gave her many proofs of his attachment to her. The king of the country, who had heard of the extraordinary gentleness and capacity of this animal, demanded her of her owner; but he, unwilling to part with his favourite, fled with her to the mountains. By order of the king he was pursued, and the soldiers that were sent after him having overtaken him when he was at the top of a steep hill, he defended himself by throwing stones at them, in which he was faithfully assisted by the elephant, who had learnt to throw stones with great dexterity. At length, however, the soldiers gained the summit of the hill, and were about to seize the fugitive, when the elephant rushed amongst them with the utmost fury, trampled some of them to death, dashed others to the ground with her trunk, and put the rest to flight. She then placed her master, who was wounded in the contest, upon her back, and conveyed him to a place of security. There are numerous well-attested anecdotes of similar instances of the affection of elephants towards their owners.
If elephants meet with a sick or wounded animal of their own species, they afford him all the assistance in their power. Should he die, they bury him, and carefully cover his body with branches of trees.
During a war in the East Indies, an elephant, that had received a flesh-wound from a cannon-ball, was conducted twice or thrice to the hospital, where he stretched himself upon the ground to have his wounds dressed. He afterwards always went thither by himself. The surgeon employed such means as he thought would conduce to his cure; he several times even cauterized the wound, and although the animal expressed the pain which this operation occasioned him, by the most piteous groaning, yet he never showed any other sentiments towards the operator than those of gratitude and affection. The surgeon was fortunate enough to completely cure him.
There is a further anecdote of this animal’s gratitude. A soldier at Pondicherry, who was accustomed, whenever he received a portion that came to his share, to carry a certain quantity of it to an elephant, having one day drank rather too freely, and finding himself pursued by the guards, who were going to take him to prison, took refuge under the elephant’s body and fell asleep. In vain did the guard try to force him from this asylum: the elephant protected him with his trunk. The next morning the soldier recovering from his drunken fit, shuddered to find himself stretched under the belly of this huge animal. The elephant, which, without doubt, perceived the embarrassment of the poor fellow, caressed him with his trunk, in order to dissipate his fears, and make him understand that he might now depart in safety.
It should not be forgotten that the poet of “The Seasons” refers to the sagacity of the elephant, his seclusion in his natural state, the arts by which he is ensnared, the magnificence of his appearance in oriental solemnities, and his use in warfare:—
Peaceful, beneath primeval trees, that cast
Their ample shade o’er Niger’s yellow stream,
And where the Ganges rolls his sacred wave;
Or mid the central depth of blackening woods,
High rais’d in solemn theatre around,
Leans the huge elephant: wisest of brutes!
O truly wise! with gentle might endow’d,
Though powerful, not destructive! Here he sees
Revolving ages sweep the changeful earth,
And empires rise and fall; regardless he
Of what the never-resting race of men
Project: thrice happy! could he ’scape their guile,
Who mine, from cruel avarice, his steps;
Or with his towery grandeur swell their state,
The pride of kings! or else his strength pervert,
And bid him rage among the mortal fray,
Astonish’d at the madness of mankind.
Thomson.
On the 27th of September, 1763, captain Sampson presented an elephant, brought by him from Bengal, to his majesty, at the queen’s house. It was conducted from Rotherhithe that morning at two o’clock, and two blacks and a seaman rode on his back. The animal was about eight feet high.
The zebra, now well known from its being frequently brought into this country, was at that time almost a “stranger in England.” One of them having been given to her late majesty queen Charlotte, obtained the name of the “queen’s ass,” and was honoured by a residence in the tower, whither the elephant was also conveyed. Their companionship occasioned some witticisms, of which there remains this specimen.
EPIGRAM
On the Elephant’s being placed in the
same table with the Zebra.
Ye critics so learn’d, whence comes it to pass
That the elephant wise should be plac’d by an ass?
This matter so strange I’ll unfold in a trice,
Some asses of state stand in need of advice
To screen them from justice, lest in an ill hour,
In the elephant’s stead they be sent to the tower.
On the occasion of captain Sampson’s present to the king, several accounts of the elephant were written. One of them says, that “the largest and finest elephants in the world are those in the island of Ceylon; next to them, those of the continent of India; and lastly, the elephant of Africa.” The Moors, who deal in these animals throughout the Indies, have a fixed price for the ordinary sort, according to their size. They measure from the nail of the fore foot to the top of the shoulder, and for every cubit high they give after the rate of 100l. of our money. An African elephant of the largest size measures about nine cubits, or thirteen feet and a half in height, and is worth about 900l., but of the breed of Ceylon, four times that sum.”
Tavernier, in proof of the superiority of the elephant of Ceylon, says, “One, I will tell you, hardly to be believed, but that which is a certain truth, which is, that when any other king, or rajah, has one of these elephants of Ceylon, if they bring them any other breed in any other place whatever, so soon as the other elephants behold the Ceylon elephants, by an instinct of nature, they do them reverence, by laying their trunks upon the ground, and raising them up again.”
Though Cæsar does not mention the fact in his commentaries, yet it is certain that he brought elephants with him to England, and that they contributed to his conquest of our predecessors. Polyænus in his “Stratagems,” says, “Cæsar in Britain attempted to pass a great river, (supposed the Thames:) Casolaunus, (in Cæsar, Cassivellaunus) king of the Britons, opposed his passage with a large body of horse and chariots. Cæsar had in his company a vastly large elephant, (μεγιστος ἑλεφας) a creature before that time unknown to the Britons. This elephant he fenced with an iron coat of mail, built a large turret on it, and putting up bowmen and slingers, ordered them to pass first into the stream. The Britons were dismayed at the sight of such an unknown and monstrous beast, (ἁοραλον κ’ ὑπεροφες θηριον) they fled, therefore, with their horses and chariots, and the Romans passed the river without opposition, terrifying their enemies by this single creature.”
In 1730, or 1731, some workmen digging the great sewer in Pall Mall, “over against the King’s Arms tavern,” discovered at the depth of twenty-eight feet, several bones of an elephant. The strata below the surface were ten or twelve feet of artificial soil; below that four or five feet of yellow sand, varying in colour till they came to the bed wherein the bones were found, which consisted of exceedingly fine sand similar to that dug on Hampstead heath.
About eighteen years previously, elephants’ bones were discovered in digging in St. James’s-square; and about fourteen years before that some were found in the same place. These various animal remains in that neighbourhood lay at about the same depth.
In 1740, the remains of an elephant were discovered by some labourers while digging a trench in the park of Frances Biddulph, esq. at Benton, in Sussex. The bones did not lie close together as those of a skeleton usually do. It was evident that the various parallel strata of the earth had never been disturbed; it was concluded that these animal deposits had remained there from the period of the deluge, when it was presumed that they had been conveyed and there, left, on the subsidence of the waters.
In 1756, the workmen of a gentleman, digging upon a high hill near Mendip for ochre and ore, discovered, at the depth of 315 feet from the surface, four teeth, not tusks, and two thighbones with part of the head of an elephant. Remains of the same animal have been at periods discovered at Mersey Island in Essex, at Harwich, at Chartham near Canterbury, at Bowden Parva, in Norfolk, Suffolk, Northamptonshire, and in various other parts of Great Britain and Ireland. Elephant’s teeth were discovered at Islington, in digging a gravel pit.
Shakspeare, in “Troilus and Cressida,” compares the slowness of Ajax to that of the elephant; and in the same play he again compares him to the same animal, and afterwards continues the comparison.
There is reason to believe, that the elephant was adopted at that period as the sign of a public inn. Antonio in “Twelfth Night” tells Sebastian,—
“In the south suburbs at the Elephant
Is best to lodge: I will bespeak our diet,
While you beguile your time.”
NATURALISTS’ CALENDER.
Mean Temperature 39·65.