Wild Beasts J Hampden Porter by J. Hampden Porter 9c9ee58c-4429-4783-9318-72c0901c7f37, 9C9EE58C-4429-4783-9318-72C0901C7F37 instant download after payment.

The elephant—“My Lord the Elephant,” as he is called in India—takes precedence of other quadrupeds upon several counts. Among these appear conspicuously the facts that he belongs to an ancient and isolated family, which has no near relations occupying lower stations in life; likewise, that from time immemorial these creatures have been strong enough to do as they pleased. This latter circumstance more particularly ensured the sincere respect of mankind, and throughout the records of the race we find its members in distinguished positions. Ganesha, the Hindu god of wisdom, had an elephant’s head, and Elephas Indicuswas worshipped from Eastern China to the highlands of Central India. In Africa this species only escaped adoration because the natives of that country were incapable of conceiving any of those abstract ideas which the animal embodied. Wherever an elephant has existed, however, men have looked up to him, and as he was not carnivorous, it comported with human reasoning to extol the benevolence of a being who, if otherwise constituted, might have done so much harm. Oriental, classic, mediæval, and modern superstitions cluster about the elephant. Pliny and Ælian often seem to be mocking at popular credulity. “Valet sensu et reliquâ sagacitate ingenii excellit elephas,” says Aristotle, and Strabo writes in the same strain. One might nearly as well take the verses of Martial for a text-book as seek information among those errors and extravagancies of antiquity which Vartomannus brought to a climax. It is no longer said that elephants who, to use Colonel Barras’ words (“India and Tiger Hunting”), “are practically sterile in captivity,” are so because of their modesty, or that this is attributable to a nobleness of soul which prevents them from propagating a race of slaves. Men would now be ashamed to say they are monotheists, and retire to solitudes to pray. But so little of comparative psychology is known, and the side lights which other sciences throw upon…