The Desert World

by Arthur Mangin

The whole form of the animal suggests the idea of unwieldy strength. His head is large, with extremely small eyes, and very large and pendulous ears; he has an arched back, and a huge thick body, which rests upon clumsy and shapeless legs; his feet are slightly divided into five rounded heaps; the upper jaw is armed with two enormous projecting tusks, which measure in many instances six or seven feet; and he is endowed with an extraordinary proboscis or trunk, of such strength that it can uproot trees, and of such delicacy that it can gather grass. This organ, nearly eight feet in length, conveys the food to the mouth, and pumps up the enormous draughts of water, which by its recurvature are turned into and driven down the capacious throat, or showered over the body. Its length supplies the place of a long neck, which would have been incompatible with the support of the large head and weighty tusks. A glance at the head will show the thickness and strength of the trunk at its insertion; and the massy arched bones of the face and thick masculine neck, are wonderfully adapted for supporting and working this powerful and marvellous instrument.

The Asiatic Elephant (Elephas maximus of Linné, Elephas Indicus of Cuvier) has small ears and tusks. A head elongated in height, and terminating in a kind of double pyramid. His hide is a clear brown colour. This species includes several varieties; that of Indo-China is remarkable for its prodigious height, which sometimes attains fifteen feet, and for a skin marked with brown spots upon a clear gray ground. The islands of the Indian Archipelago likewise contain several varieties of elephants, which experts can easily distinguish from one another. In every species are found the albinos, or white elephants, which receive the marked veneration of every Indian race, and particularly of those of Siam and Pegu.

The African Elephant (Elephas Africanus) differs from the preceding in the structure of his grinder teeth, in the length of his tusks, which are enormous, and in his ears, whose trumpet is also of great dimensions. He was formerly met with throughout all the African continent, and was much employed in war by the Carthaginians and Egyptians. From the northern regions of Africa he has now disappeared, but large herds still haunt the whole southern division, from the Senegal to the Cape, and the eastern districts, as far north as Abyssinia. He is also found in all the African interior, whose inhabitants deal in ivory as the staple of their commerce. His height is equal to that of the Asiatic elephant, and the habits of the two species are identical.

Elephants live in the forests, gathering in troops of from thirty to about one hundred individuals, and as they require a very extensive area of pasturage, it is said that they pitilessly expel from their domains all other animals which trespass therein to share the product.

Each herd marches under the guidance of an acknowledged chief. When they sally forth from their retreats to devastate a field, or to wander in quest of fresh pastures, they observe a very regular order of march; the young and the females occupying the centre, the males assemble round them in a circle. If danger threatens, the little ones take refuge under the breast of their mothers, who fold their trunks about them.

The young elephant is suckled for two years, and during that period attains the stature of four feet and a half. At the end of the third year he is nearly six feet high. He continues to grow, but less rapidly, until twenty-two or twenty-four years old. The female adults measure generally from seven to nine feet in height, and the males from ten feet and a half to twelve. As may be inferred from the tardiness of his growth, the elephant enjoys the privilege of longevity. He has been known to live in captivity to the age of 120 or 130 years; but Cuvier was of opinion that in his free and wild condition he might well number nearly a couple of centuries.

The Africans hunt the elephant for the sake of his ivory and flesh; in India, and the isles of the Indian Ocean, to reduce them to subjection. In Africa, for many negro populations, ivory and “ebony wood” (an euphuism by which the slave-dealers designate their black slaves) are the sole articles of commerce, and the majority of the English, Dutch, and French colonists carry on a considerable traffic in elephants’ teeth. The negroes excavate wide pits which they cover over with branches; and the elephants falling into them are precipitated headlong upon sharpened stakes; or they kill them either with arrows, assegays, or musketry. Hunting them with spears is truly a ferocious pastime. The poor elephant only succumbs after receiving so great a number of projectiles that his body resembles an enormous porcupine. He rarely turns upon his aggressors; he seeks to fly; he fills the air with plaintive wailings; the female throws her huge bulk between her young ones and the enemy; the male sometimes rushes furiously upon his assailants, and woe to the latter if he overtake them; he crushes them under his hoofs, he pierces them with his tusks, or seizes them with his trunk, and dashes them upon the earth a shapeless and bleeding mass. But nimble and experienced hunters easily elude his charge, whose onset he is prevented from moderating by his weight, or from rapidly changing its direction.

But firearms, and especially the recently perfected rifles, are assuredly the best weapons to employ against the leviathan. With a Westley-Richards, for instance, a good marksman, aiming at the shoulder-joint or the ear, is certain to bring down his game; he may post himself at a distance, and avoid exposure, while the victim is saved from a cruel agony.