[Footnote 1: One of the most venerable authorities by whom the fallacy was transmitted to modern times was PHILIP de THAUN, who wrote, about the year 1121, A.D., his _Livre des Créatures_, dedicated to Adelaide of Louvaine, Queen of Henry I. of England. In the copy of it printed by the Historical Society of Science in 1841, and edited by Mr. WRIGHT, the following passage occurs:-- "Et Ysidre nus dit ki le elefant descrit, * * * * * Es jambes par nature nen ad que une jointure, Il ne pot pas gesir quant il se volt dormir, Ke si cuchet estait par sei nen leveraît; Pur ceo li stot apuier, el lui del cucher, U à arbre u à mur, idunc dort aseur. E le gent de la terre, ki li volent conquere, Li mur enfunderunt, u le arbre encíserunt; Quant li elefant vendrat, ki s'i apuierat, La arbre u le mur carrat, e il tribucherat; Issi faiterement le parnent cele gent." P. 100.] As elephants were but rarely seen in Europe prior to the seventeenth century, there were but few opportunities of correcting the popular fallacy by ocular demonstration. Hence SHAKSPEARE still believed that, "The elephant hath joints; but none for courtesy: His legs are for necessity, not flexure:"[1] and DONNE sang of "Nature's great masterpiece, an Elephant; The only harmless great thing: Yet Nature hath given him no knee to bend: Himself he up-props, on himself relies; Still sleeping stands."[2] [Footnote 1: _Troilus and Cressida_, act ii. sc. 3. A.D. 1609.] [Footnote 2: _Progress of the Soul_, A.D. 1633.] Sir THOMAS BROWNE, while he argues against the delusion, does not fail to record his suspicion, that "although the opinion at present be reasonably well suppressed, yet from the strings of tradition and fruitful recurrence of errour, it was not improbable it might revive in the next generation;"[1]--an anticipation which has proved singularly correct; for the heralds still continued to explain that the elephant is the emblem of watchfulness, "_nec jacet in somno,"_[2] and poets almost of our own times paint the scene when "Peaceful, beneath primeval trees, that cast Their ample shade on Niger's yellow stream, Or where the Ganges rolls his sacred waves, _Leans_ the huge Elephant."[3] [Footnote 1: Sir T. BROWNE, _Vulgar Errors_, A.D. 1646.] [Footnote 2: RANDAL HOME'S _Academy of Armory_, A.D. 1671. HOME only perpetuated the error of GUILLAM, who wrote his _Display of Heraldry_ in A.D. 1610; wherein he explains that the elephant is "so proud of his strength that he never bows himself to any (_neither indeed can he_), and when he is once down he cannot rise up again."--Sec. III. ch. xii. p. 147.] [Footnote 3: THOMSON'S _Seasons_, A.D. 1728.]