[16] Menageries, etc. published by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, vol. i. p. 68: “The Elephant,” ch. iii. It will be seen that I have quoted repeatedly from this volume, because it is the most compendious and careful compilation with which I am acquainted of the information previously existing regarding the elephant. The author incorporates no speculations of his own, but has most diligently and agreeably arranged all the facts collected by his predecessors. The story of antipathy between the elephant and rhinoceros is probably borrowed from Ælian de Nat. lib. xvii. c. 44.
[17] “The Correspondencia of Madrid gives the following account of a fight between a Ceylon elephant and two bulls, which took place at Saragossa:—‘The elephant was walking quietly about the arena when the first bull was released and rushed at it with all his might. The elephant received his antagonist with great coolness, and threw him down with the utmost ease. The bull rose again and made two more attacks, which the elephant resented by killing him with his tusks. The conqueror did not seem in the least excited, but quietly drank some water offered by his keeper, and ate several ears of Indian corn. A second bull was then released, and in a few minutes suffered the same fate as the first.’” (Globe, Nov. 9, 1864.) The Times says the elephant killed it “with a thrust of his tusks.”
[18] Menageries, etc.: “The Elephant,” ch. iii. In the Anglo-Saxon Epistola Alexandri ad Aristotelem, which has been printed by Cockayne in his Narratiunculæ Anglice conscriptæ, the belief in the alleged antipathy of the elephant to swine is embodied in the text and is thus rendered in the Latin version: “Pervenimus demum ad silvas Indorum ultimas; ubi cum castra collocavissemus, ceperamus velle epulari sub nocte hora xi; cum subito pabulatores lignatoresque exanimes nunciabant, ut celeriter arma caperemus, venire e silvis elephantorum immensas greges ad expugnanda castra. Imperavi ergo Thessalicis equitibus ut ascenderent equos, secumque tollerent sues, quorum grunnitus timere bestias noveram, et occurrere quam primum elephantis jussi ... nec mora trepidantes elephanti conversi sunt. Quieta nox fuit usque ad lucem.” (P. 58.) Another allusion to the same legendary incident will be found in the Lyfe of Alisaunder, one of the most ancient English romances, reprinted by Weber in his Metrical Romances of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Centuries.
“Forth went the kyng thennes with hy;
Of the forme-ward he herd grete cry
For hy weren assailed of olifauntz.
The kyng highed, and his sergeauntz:
Ac, so I fynde on the booke,
By Porus conseil hogges hy took
And beten them so they shrightte: