In the present work, it is not necessary to refer particularly to the internal organization of the elephant, but the subject is replete with interest. The enormous heart, a foot in diameter, in its contraction exerts tons of pressure; and the blood forced out by it must attain almost the force of water from the hose of a fire-engine. Hunters have often been astonished at seeing elephants, which they have been chasing for some time, insert their trunks into their mouths, and there obtain a supply of water that is blown over the dry and heated body. The explanation of this is, that the stomach of the elephant resembles that of the camel, in having a chamber that can be cut off or separated from the digestive cavity, in which about ten gallons of water is stored as a reserve supply, or to be used as occasion requires. The female elephant is generally smaller than the male. The mammary glands are situated between the fore-legs, and the calf nurses with its mouth, instead of the trunk as was once supposed. The period of gestation is about five hundred and ninety-seven days. The weight of the elephant at birth differs in individuals. One observed by Owen weighed one hundred and seventy-five pounds, and stood two feet ten inches in height. The little elephant Bridgeport weighed two hundred and forty-five pounds at birth, and stood three feet in height. The baby elephant America, born in Philadelphia, weighed two hundred and thirteen and a half pounds, and measured thirty-four inches and a half at the shoulder. It grew so rapidly, that in eleven months it gained about seven hundred pounds,—not so very surprising, as it came of a very heavy family. Its mother weighed seven thousand and twenty pounds, and was only twenty-three years old; and the father, who was three years older, four tons. The baby’s trunk, or proboscis, was at first twelve inches long, and nine inches in circumference at the root, or base. The young Asiatic elephant grows about eleven inches in the first year, eight in the second, six inches in the third, five in the fourth, five in the fifth, in the sixth three and a half, and in the seventh, two and a half, the measurements having been made by Mr. Corse. CHAPTER II. HABITS AND WAYS OF ELEPHANTS. The most favorable locality to observe wild elephants in India is in Mysore, where the western ghats, the Billiga-rungun hills, and the Goondulpet and Kákankoté forests, afford fine opportunities to the naturalist and sportsman to observe the largest of living land animals in the haunts of its choice. It is here that the elephant-catcher of the British Government, Mr. George P. Sanderson, makes his headquarters, and has obtained such signal success for many years.