The elephant is generally considered as of the masculine gender, an animal distinguished not only by great strength and superiority of size, but also by sagacity, docility, and fortitude.
“The elephant has joints, but not for courtesy;
His legs are for necessity, not flexure.”—Shakspeare.
To a cat we almost always assign the female sex; to a dog, on the contrary, or one of the canine species, we attribute the masculine gender.
“A cat, as she beholds the light, draws the ball of her eye small and long.”—Peacham on Drawing.
“The dog is a domestic animal remarkably various in his species.”
It would be easy to illustrate, by more examples, this ascription of either male or female sex to animals, when we speak of them in the species, or are not acquainted with the sex of the individual; but these now adduced will, I presume, be sufficient.
By what principle this phraseology is dictated, or whether it be merely casual or arbitrary in its origin, it would be of no utility at present to inquire. It may be necessary, however, to remark that, when speaking of animals, particularly those of inferior size, we frequently consider them as devoid of sex. “It is a bold and daring creature,” says a certain writer, speaking of a cat, “and also cruel to its enemy; and never gives over, till it has destroyed it, if possible. It is also watchful, dexterous, swift, and pliable.”
Before I dismiss this subject, I would request the reader’s attention to an idiom which seems to have escaped the notice of our grammarians. It frequently happens, as I have already observed, that our language furnishes two distinct terms for the male and the female, as shepherd, shepherdess. It is to be observed, however, that the masculine term has a general meaning, expressing both male and female, and is always employed, when the office, occupation, profession, &c., and not the sex of the individual is chiefly to be expressed; and that the feminine term is used in those cases only, when discrimination of sex is indispensably necessary. This may be illustrated by the following examples. If I say, “The poets of this age are distinguished more by correctness of taste, than sublimity of conception,” I clearly include in the term poet, both male and female writers of poetry. If I say, “She is the best poetess in this country,” I assign her the superiority over those only of her own sex. If I say, “She is the best poet in this country,” I pronounce her superior to all other writers of poetry, both male and female. “Spinning,” says Lord Kames in his Sketches, “is a female occupation, and must have had a female inventor.” If he had said “a female inventress,” the expression would have been pleonastic. If he had said “must have had an inventress,” he would not have sufficiently contrasted the male and the female; he would have merely predicated the necessity of an inventress. He, therefore, properly adopts the term inventor as applicable to each of the sexes, limiting it to the female by the appropriate term[16]. When distinction of sex is necessary for the sake of perspicuity, or where the sex, rather than the general idea implied by the term, is the primary object, the feminine noun must be employed to express the female; thus, “I hear that some authoresses are engaged in this work.”—Political Register. Here the feminine term is indispensable[17]. This subject will be resumed in “the Critical Remarks and Illustrations.”