money lost to the government was considerable.” No subject relating to elephants is so difficult to determine by a mere casual examination, as that relating to its size. Statements from natives can never be relied upon; as in times of excitement a large bull will appear twenty feet high, and the observers are not at all unwilling to make affidavit to that effect. Asiatic elephants rarely, if ever, attain a height of ten feet at the shoulder. The largest in the Madras commissariat stud to-day measures nine feet ten inches. The next largest is owned by his Highness the Mahárájah of Mysore, and measures nine feet two inches, and is forty years old. Females are usually smaller. Two in the collection at Dacca measure eight feet five inches, and eight feet three inches respectively; and, to show that this is exceptional, Mr. Sanderson measured one hundred and forty in 1874, and found that the largest females measured just eight feet. Mistakes and exaggerations occur from the fact that elephants are often measured by throwing a tape over the shoulders, and, when both ends touch the ground, accepting one-half as the correct height: nine inches may be gained in this way in measuring an eight-foot animal. Mr. Corse, a former superintendent of the East India Company’s elephants at Tiperah, a province of Bengal, who probably saw a greater number of elephants than any European, states that he never heard of more than one Asiatic elephant that exceeded ten feet. This was a large tusker, the property of the Vizier of Oude. Accurate measurements were made, which were as follows:— FT. IN. From foot to foot over the shoulder 22 10½ From the top of the shoulder, perpendicular height 10 6 From the top of the head, when set up 12 2 From the top of the face to the insertion of the tail 15 11 [Illustration: PLATE II. ELEPHANTS MOVING TIMBER. _Page 34._]